Ten Thousand Swords
by Seeker7246
Summary: There is no victory without sacrifice. This was a truth that Adrian had known all his life, his father sacrificed himself for the city he loved, his mother sacrificed her time, her future for her children and Adrian had chosen to sacrifice what meagre things he could offer to try and help his family. He did not want to be a sacrifice for another world. He did not want to be a Hero.
1. Chapter 1

Adrian shook his head to stop the disorientation. It took a moment but when he focused on his surroundings; the confusion manifested again. The most jarring fact was that he was not sitting in front of his computer. Instead, he stood on a stone surface that had glowing symbols on it. It seemed to be the only thing that provided the light in the room.

Another fact that screamed insanity? The beautiful sword with a blue gem embedded in the hilt. The fact that he was suddenly holding a sword was odd. Worse, he recognized the sword from a picture he had seen. A picture from a Light Novel he had been reading.

A quick look around to convince himself that this insanity was _not _happening failed immediately. The room itself was remarkable, dozens of people around what he could now tell was an altar. Each of them with a weird glowing gemstone in their hands. He noted the other three weapons and their wielders. All of them looked like their pictures. There were some differences, which he assumed were because these were actual people and not fictional characters, but their heights, hairstyles, builds and weapons suggested that these were the other three heroes, from the same novel he had been reading.

Adrian's heart pounded as realization dawned. He didn't want to believe it.

It was then that he saw the small icon that had been in the edge of his vision. Adrian didn't want to activate the icon; he didn't want to be here in this mid-apocalyptic world; he didn't want to be away from his family. The impulse faded a moment later. The desire to confirm _exactly _what the hell was happening won out.

He focused on the icon, and his nightmare solidified into reality. Adrian was in the world of the Rising of the Shield Hero. The idea was ludicrous. But he couldn't deny that everything felt real_. _Adrian rarely had dreams or nightmares and he wasn't hallucinating...unless they had drugged him? The screen that manifested in front of him didn't help him gauge the situation.

It was rather different from what he had read about in the novel, but one piece of information stuck out. 

_Equipment: Legendary Holy Sword (Base)_

Adrian tried to stop the chill from spreading down his spine but failed. He could feel his breathing slowly go to the pattern that his teacher had drilled into him and slowly calmed down, but the utter ridiculousness of the situation was still overwhelming.

"Oh, Heroes! Please save our world." said an old man wearing an ornate red coloured robe.

"What?!"

The voice and the choral response from the other heroes broke his attention away from the status screen.

"Hey! What is that supposed to mean?" asked the Spear Hero, taking a half-step forward.

Adrian carefully studied the reactions of the robed men. If this truly was the same situation as the story he had been reading then he was in a lot of trouble. He needed as much information as he could get ASAP or he was as good as dead in the long run.

That assumed that this was all real instead of some absurd dream or hallucination.

"Our world is on the brink of catastrophe Heroes, we have summoned you all through an ancient ceremony so we may have your aid in stopping the calamities that are to follow." he went to his knees, "O' Legendary Heroes lend us your power to save the world."

Disbelief struck like a meteor. Adrian had _never _seen someone kneel before him in submission. If this was truly a kidnapping by some cultists or a dream, then it was surely an absurd one.

Unfortunately, everything was feeling more and more real. The weight of the sword, the sense of comfort he felt in holding onto it, the sweat he could feel on his back, the smell of some incense that he had no recognition of. All of it was real, as real as any other day in his life.

Well, somewhat like any other day, he normally wouldn't have to question his perception of reality.

It seemed however that the other three did not share his shock.

"Well, it wouldn't hurt to…" the Shield said before the other two interrupted him.

"I don't think so." said the Bow.

"Yeah, we can go back to our world right? We can talk about your problems later."

Adrian was uneasy at their swift answers. Sure one was rather polite and the other two relatively rude but that hardly mattered, mere basic variations in personality. Did none of these three care about the fact that people who had performed interdimensional kidnapping while making sure that the language barrier was not a concern surrounded them?

That they could do that should bring up the question of what _else _these kidnappers could do. Had they not thought of it? Were they so very confident that this was the introduction to a game that they assumed that they would not die or suffer in some other manner?

Adrian felt a little awkward at being the only one who had been silent but crushed the feeling. This was not the time to let petty emotions and herd behaviour rule.

"You guys haven't even considered our opinion on this, have you? I mean, are you just going to use us and then throw us back to our world?" the Spear continued.

"Yeah, that's a job, isn't it? Send us back, we have no reason to be here." said the Bow Hero.

Adrian noted that Naofumi looked a little stunned, as did some robed men. To their credit, however, the robed men quickly collected themselves and their leader, the man who had knelt before them, spoke swiftly.

"I am sure that the King would be happy to speak to you regarding your compensation for your aid, Lord Heroes. Please follow me. We have no intention of disrespecting your actions by disregarding them."

Adrian ignored their follow-up comments and followed the robed men once one of them opened the door. He wasn't sure where the other heroes were getting their confidence from, but he had no intention of being rude, not when it could get him killed or worse. Unfortunately, they would lump him in with them unless he made a separate impression.

He walked forward a little faster than the other three and moved towards the only robed man who had spoken up till this moment.

"Greetings, I am Adrian Black. I had a few more questions about this whole situation. Would you mind answering them?" he asked while smiling slightly. Adrian suspected that if he was reading the situation right, no matter how inconvenient they would accommodate his request, for now.

"Of course, my Lord. Please ask. We do not have long before we arrive before His Highness, but we surely have time for a question or two." he said, smiling pleasantly while giving a quick bow.

"Good. I suppose the first concern is regarding whether you can send us back to our world," said Adrian. Yet even as he spoke he knew that he had been _too _blunt. Too foolish. It had been _stupid _to ask this right after they had kidnapped him.

The man winced. He must have been hoping for an easier question. He took a breath and then answered carefully, "I am afraid that we do not have a method to return you to your world, Sir Hero. The ceremony we used to summon you is ancient. Truthfully, were it not for our desperation and how incredibly devastating the Waves of Calamity are we would never have used such a poorly studied ceremony."

Adrian tried not to let his fury and grief show on his face. This answer was the expected one. Adrian could not tell if the man was lying or telling the truth. However, it didn't truly matter. What mattered was that he could not expect any aid from this nation in his goal to return home. He would need leverage to force the issue or find an alternative.

"I see," said Adrian, trying to stop his tone from showing his anger, but given the man's flinch, he must have failed.

Adrian changed the subject while trying to rein in his temper, "Then what can you tell me about this weapon I am bound to? The status menu seemed to describe it as the Legendary Sword but also mentioned that it was the base form with a massive number of options. I have assumed that I have to level up myself and unseal the Sword somehow. Can you tell me anything else about it?"

Adrian heard a small sound of surprise from behind him, probably one of the Heroes, but ignored it. Now was the time to get this man's perspective on the sword and further the illusion that he understood nothing, knew nothing...which was true enough.

The man's eyes lit up, and he spoke without taking a pause, "My lord, they say the Legendary weapons to grow stronger with their wielder unlocking their legendary power in a way that serves their masters best. It is said that their power is limitless" His excitement climbed, "But I am afraid that all we have are Legends of the amazing feats of the Heroes. It is said that the Sword Hero can cut through a mountain if needed and that the Bow Hero can strike down a target from the other side of the world. The Shield Hero can survive even an army attempting to harm him with no trouble at all..."

The man continued, and Adrian did not interrupt. It was a rambling explanation, but it was still fascinating. Still, it was a little stunning just what an overblown reputation the Heroes had in this world. He had not realized just _how _powerful they considered the Heroes to be.

"We are here Headmaster Andre." one of the other men interrupted after they had climbed through the tower and walked along the corridors for nearly five minutes.

"Ah yes. Thank you, Nathaniel. I must have lost track. My apologies Sir Hero, I have monopolized our conversation. Please forgive me." He said bowing.

Adrian smiled slightly, finding this old man to be likeable, he did not trust him, but Adrian could not deny that he sensed no real malice from this him.

"It isn't a problem Headmaster Andre, but if we could continue this conversation later I would be grateful," Adrian said.

The old man almost jumped, "Yes, yes. It would be an honour, it would be wonderful to hear about your world from you. I have always wondered about them, we have records showing that many Heroes are from worlds that have no magic-"

"Headmaster," the same man interrupted again.

"Ah, forgive this old man, let us not keep the King waiting." he said, and walked towards the guarded door in front of them, "Sir Black please speak to me in my tower, I spend all my time there."

He walked towards the guards and spoke to them for a moment. They were far enough that all he heard was a soft murmur.

Then the guard signalled the other two standing there. They slowly opened the ornate gate.

It was time to meet the king.


	2. Chapter 2

The throne room was ornate. Every inch was well lit and had something or the other occupying the space. Expensive vases with beautiful flowers whose fragrance seemed to spread through the room. Lovely tapestries littered the walls. Even the support pillars had something painted on them. It was a room meant to show off the wealth and power of its inhabitants and despite that; it was not overwhelming to where it felt ridiculous.

Adrian was certain that it was not something the King had arranged for.

The King was sitting on his throne, on a raised dais. Next to him was an empty throne that was higher than his own, something Adrian would not have noticed had he not been looking for some sign of the Queen. There were dozens of people in the sides of the room with a few more on the balconies high above the floor, every one of them dressed in elaborate ways. Women had complex hairstyles, clothes with jewels embedded in them and often had what appeared to be makeup. The men wore complex clothing that Adrian could not describe. It all looked very odd, but these men and women were rich and powerful. They were probably nobility, though they could also be wealthy merchants or some other people with power.

Aultcray had prepared for the Four Heroes and was more than happy to make a spectacle.

The entire room full of well-dressed people, the room had an upward slope as one approached the throne, the raised dais and the balconies all forcing anyone who sought an audience to look up to these people was nothing more than a power play. In fact, Adrian suspected that this entire thing was a show that the King was putting on. Presuming that what he had read in the Light novel was accurate and that Andre had spoken the truth, then by showing that the King had control over or at least access to the four Heroes, he could probably gain a great deal of power over other nations and his vassals.

Adrian could respect such a move. The King had time to prepare and put on a show, to show his power over figures that existed in Legends. Enhancing his prestige. It was a wise thing to do once the Heroes had been summoned _if_ they played along, and truthfully Adrian saw no choice _but_ to play along. There were guards surrounding the room but Adrian was not worried about them, or a direct attack on himself. What concerned him were the Shadows that were probably in the palace at this moment.

What if the Sword Hero did not play along? If all the Legendary Heroes choose not to play along? Would they have an accident? Would four new heroes be summoned to take their place?

Adrian did not know, he had no idea if that was even possible or wise, and that made him very, very nervous.

In this scenario, the King held all the cards, and the cards which were in Adrian's favour were ones that he was not aware of and thus could not use. It was like playing a game against an expert while not even being aware of the rules. For the moment all he could do was play nice and submit, let the man put a leash on him so he could get out of this situation with his head intact. In time Adrian knew that he could gain the leverage needed to escape this nation's grasp, but for the moment he had no choice.

This did not still his fury. Adrian was taken from his home, dumped into a World that was a cage no matter how large it was, and was commanded to fight against the Waves that were likely endless. No matter how they dressed it up with the talk of Heroes and honour and other such things, the reality was simple. The Hero of the Sword was a tool, just like the other Heroes. And this tool had one purpose, to stop the Waves. If the tools failed, then they would replace the set.

It was disgusting to have been reduced to this. All he could hope was that what he read in the Light novel and what little he knew about the web novel were overdramatized and that reality was much kinder and simpler than the stories, but Adrian did not have much hope. Life was rarely that kind.

"So these four young men are the four Holy Heroes?" the King stated. An odd introduction, but perhaps it was merely an icebreaker. The condescension did not help Adrian's darkening mood.

"My name is Aultcray Melromarc XXXII, and I rule these lands. Heroes show me your faces!" he spoke with a firm voice, a reminder of his authority and an implicit command to be obeyed. It was interesting how he sought to imply their obedience by commanding them to do something that they were already doing.

Still, his name was something that confirmed things further for him. This was going along almost exactly like the light novel. Plus, the absence of his wife, the summoning of all four heroes, the name Melromarc all of that implied that this was the exact scenario that he had read about. Adrian did not want to assume that the Light novel would be fully valid, such a thing would be unwise. Didn't his own presence show that things were going off the rails?

"Now then, I shall begin with an explanation. This country is on the brink of destruction." he started, his voice slowly changing into a more sober tone, "Our greatest adventurers and our army all stand ready but their strength will not be enough to fight the coming darkness."

The king slowly wove a story about a world threatened by the Waves of Calamity. Adrian had to admit, the man was a proficient speaker, his tone was sober and yet imperious, he spoke of the apocalypse and yet did so with confidence. The story he spoke of was a familiar one, the Waves would come with the signals of the ancient hourglass under the prophecies made by the oracles of old but the people of the current era had scoffed at the warnings given, considering it nothing more than a distant myth, until the Waves started as the sands ran down. The very sky split open and a dimensional rift opened up releasing monster after monster until the brave men and women of this nation defeated them. But the Waves would only grow worse until it consumed the nation.

"So, we need your aid." the King said, "Our World needs your support young heroes," he concluded.

Adrian jumped in. He did not remember what the Heroes had said in the Light novel. What he remembered was that they had been impolite. Adrian did not know about the source of their confidence, perhaps they genuinely had a reason, but as of this moment the Four Heroes were being perceived as one unit and he had no intention of letting the other three set the tone of this critical conversation.

"Thank you for the information Your Majesty." he said, "I'm sure that I speak for all of us when I say that we appreciate an explanation to this rather novel event, however as it stands we are merely starting with weapons that have most of their power sealed away after being taken away from our homes and expected to save this world," Adrian observed the King and the man standing to his right carefully. Their reaction to his next statement would tell, "I hope that we are to receive sufficient aid for our quest. As you have stated, failure in this scenario is unacceptable, and without the right tools we are unlikely to succeed."

Unfortunately, the Spear Hero took this chance to speak up, preventing Adrian from continuing, "Yeah. I get where you guys are coming from, but we aren't people you can just command. Don't think we'll just work for nothing."

"This seems fine...for you." spoke the Bow Hero

And to Adrian's surprise, even the Shield Hero spoke up, "As they have said, we don't have a responsibility towards this world. If we dedicate ourselves to securing peace and prosperity for your nation can we expect anything except a 'thank you'?"

Adrian felt a little helpless as these three fools ruined his little plan to gain more aid from the king. They were demanding compensation, but did they even know what they could offer? Did they have any idea about the disposition of the people they were negotiating with? For all, they knew this King could have their heads chopped off for what he considers disrespect. Adrian had planned to convince the King to provide them various materials, tools and access to blacksmiths and such, getting as much aid as possible as early as possible when it was the most necessary. It had been a longshot, but Adrian had planned to attempt it at the least. But he had _not _wished to start with demands. Not when they were in the _weakest _position, they would ever be. Adrian could not be sure that their strength would grow, but it was only natural that with time they would have more of an advantage.

Now it was a little too late to ask for something like that. These three heroes were acting as mercenaries, not loyal troops who would fight and die for the sake of the Kingdom. Who was the king more likely to support in this case?

Adrian had skimmed over this part when he had been reading, but living through it? He felt incredulous. Where the hell did these guys get their confidence from? Were they living in the same world he was in? Or was it they knew something he didn't?

The King, however, shot his advisor to the side a glance, before turning back to them, "It is only natural that we shall compensate you all for your efforts." He continued with a smile, "We shall aid you financially and provide you with all that you require."

The three fools didn't hide their excitement, and Adrian felt more than a little stunned that they were so willing to express their emotions in front of the very people they were attempting to extract wealth from. Still, the King's statement was a wonderful time to jump in.

"Thank you, Your Majesty. I had a specific request, however. It is detailed information regarding the Waves and the Legendary weapons we wield. I hoped to speak to an expert regarding the matter as soon as possible." Adrian said.

"We have the Headmaster here. I am certain that he will be more than willing to aid you in this endeavour." the King stated calmly, before turning to look behind Adrian where Andre had been standing since the beginning of the audience.

The robed man walked forward when he was addressed and knelt before the King before stating, "It would be my honour to inform the Holy Heroes about their concerns, Your Majesty. Please leave it to me."

"I believe I have met your concerns a young man." the King said, and Adrian had to fight for a moment to keep calm in the face of his condescension.

"Indeed, Your Majesty. Thank you," he said, instead of what he wanted to spit at the man.

The King then continued, "We shall also provide any other aid required to the other heroes. Please rest assured about these matters."

The spear hero launched himself into the conversation at this point before shooting Adrian a small glare. "Well, if you keep your promise, we won't have a problem."

"Do not presume to think you have bought us off though. I'll help as long as we are not enemies."

"Yeah, this is fine," Naofumi stated, looking a little unsure.

"Very well then Heroes. Tell us your names."

"My name is Motoyasu Kitamura, I'm 21 and a college student."

Ah, so that had been his name. Truthfully, Adrian had remembered the man as the Spear Hero and left it at that. Now he had a name to add to the face and the list of irritating traits. The man was fairly handsome, but his irritating personality was truly something that Adrian could not tolerate for long. Not when he had recklessly charged forward in a situation like this.

"Ok, my turn, I am Itsuki Kawasumi, I'm 17 and still in High School."

The bow hero was young. To be honest, Adrian had always imagined them as slightly older and yet here was a brat, if his memory served him correctly then the Sword Hero had been, in fact, younger than this kid and yet they were given the keys to immense power. No wonder they had screwed up so often. Despite their incredible potential for power, they were still young. Hell, Adrian was older than Itsuki and he still felt that he was too unprepared for such power. Then again, what _could _prepare you for something like this?

Adrian took his turn here, "I am Adrian Black, 22 years of age and a software engineer."

Adrian noted a look of puzzlement on the King's face when he mentioned his education. Interesting, the translation method of the Sword was not perfect. It could not interpret something so out of context for a medieval society easily.

"I guess I'm last. My name is Naofumi Iwatani. I'm a twenty-year-old college student."

The King looked down at us cooly. Nothing more than a hint of arrogance in his face. Adrian felt his annoyance rise again at this man who likely viewed them as nothing more than pawns on his board.

"Now then, Motoyasu, Itsuki and Adrian was it?" he started, ignoring Naofumi.

"Uh, Your Grace, you've forgotten me," said Naofumi feeling awkward.

"Ah yes, my apologies, Mr Naofumi." he said, not changing his expression in the slightest, "Now then, Heroes. Please check your status so you have an objective evaluation of yourselves."

Interesting, was this meant to be a test? Or a display of his disdain for the Shield Hero?

To his surprise, while it confused Motoyasu and Itsuki, Naofumi was already looking around in thin air in front of him.

"Whoa, this is weird," Naofumi said.

"What are you talking about man?" said Motoyasu, "You're just staring at nothing."

"He is looking at his Status Page." Adrian explained, "I think you should be able to see a small icon in the corner of your vision. Focus on it for a moment and the screen should flare-up. It should have some fairly detailed information about yourself."

Itsuki made a surprised sound a moment later and Motoyasu turned to look at him before looking around for a moment and then squinted before he flinched backwards and said, "Hey, you're right. It is a Status Page."

Then for the first time since Adrian had seen he saw a trace of nervousness enter the faces of Motoyasu and Itsuki. Realizing that they were level 1 was quite a wake-up call.

"Can we even fight at all with these numbers?"

"Yeah, this is too low."

"What is all this?" asked Naofumi, a bit of awe seeping into his tone.

"This is Status Magic Heroes. Everyone in this world has it." the King stated, "And as for the low numbers, it is something that you can enhance on your journey to strengthen the Legendary Weapons you possess."

"You mean these weapons don't start off strong. We gotta get them to a useful stage." said Motoyasu, "That's a drag, we should at least use other better weapons until then."

Adrian felt like laughing as the moment he considered that he got a warning. His Sword had no intention of allowing him to even consider wielding another weapon.

_**A Legendary Hero may only wield the Legendary Weapon assigned to them.**_

Adrian cut in here, however. These fools were putting on quite the show for the nobles, they more of their weaknesses they showed the greater the disadvantage they would be in later, no doubt they were being tested even now.

"Let us leave that for later. Our priority should be to boost our weapons as much as is practical like his Majesty has requested," said Adrian.

The other three were excited, and it was showing in their behaviour. Adrian felt the start of a headache. He had known that the other three heroes had looked ridiculous in canon but he had not been certain how much of that had been Naofumi's bias against them. Watching them all now, genuinely excited when they should be nervous as all hell, he felt a little confidence in his own assessment of them.

They were immature or perhaps naïve. One way or another Adrian was certain that they would not be useful allies.

"So are we going to make a party," said Naofumi.

Adrian frowned at that as his weapon flared up with another notification.

_**The Legendary Weapons have adverse effects on the growth of the weapon and wielder if in proximity to other weapons.**_

These weapons were a lot more active than he had assumed. Were they observing the world through his senses or did they have some sort of esoteric senses of their own, perhaps through the gem or something?

Adrian shook it off. Now in the middle of the throne was not the time to wonder about the intricacies of the Legendary weapons. He frowned when he heard the King said, "Heroes I shall send out a message to the nearby town. We shall find you the companions needed for your journey."

At this, all four of them bowed, and said, "Thank you, Your Majesty."

But Adrian's thoughts did not match his words or actions, he had a terrible feeling about these party members; he had no memory of whom had joined the Heroes in the story he had read, but he could probably assume that these party members were probably informants at best and assassins at worst.

They would probably not harm him right now directly, but filtering information to him and informing others about information regarding him would probably be something that he would have to live with until he gained enough strength to escape Melromarc's grasp.

They left the throne room after receiving an invitation to dinner, but as a servant lead the three heroes to their waiting rooms and he followed Andre to his tower, he couldn't help but feel his fear rising as he realized once again just what a horrible world he was now trapped in.


	3. Chapter 3

**Naofumi POV**

Naofumi carefully scanned the massive amount of information present in his Status Menu, the whole thing still felt surreal, the fact that he had a numerical estimation of his physical self, the fact that he had an indestructible shield that could not undergo wear and tear and would only grow stronger as he levelled up. It was incredible, the whole thing was like a game, only a hell of a lot more detailed then one, which made sense, even if this world was gamelike, it was still pretty real.

He looked to the other two Heroes who were in the sitting room with him, they too were looking into their status screens, it looked a little odd, kind of like they were having a daydreaming contest or something that they were really into, but he suspected that he looked just as weird when he was concentrating on his Status Menu.

Naofumi took another look at his Menu, nothing that his Weapon Map had nothing unlocked at all beyond the Small Shield, but he could see literally thousands of options that could be unlocked, normally Naofumi was not the type of guy to obsess over unlocking everything but in this new world he couldn't help but feel incredibly tempted to unseal all the power in the shield.

Still, he was a little concerned about this whole thing and how gamelike it was, maybe he should ask the others, they were Heroes like him after all.

"Hey guys," said Naofumi," doesn't this whole thing seem like a game to you."

"Like a game," scoffed Motoyasu, "this is a game. This is almost exactly like Emerald Online. The Menu, the weapons, hell even the country is pretty much the same."

"Ah, excuse me Mr Motoyasu, I'm afraid that you are incorrect. This is indeed similar to a game but it is called Dimension Wave." interrupted Itsuki, while raising his hand slightly, like he was in class or something.

"Don't joke around Itsuki, this thing is a duplicate of the MMO, hell it's the most famous MMO on the planet there's no way any gamer wouldn't know about it."

And yet Naofumi didn't know about either game, the two of the other Heroes continued arguing for the moment, but Naofumi found it odd, he wasn't bragging but he was a pretty big Otaku, if this Dimension Wave and Emerald Online were truly famous games then there was no doubt that he would have heard about it.

"Hey Naofumi, you've heard of Emerald Online right?" asked Motoyasu.

"Sorry guys," said Naofumi, shrugging," I haven't heard of any video game like this world. I read a book that was kind of like it but I've never heard of either of the games you guys mentioned."

At this point both of them were quiet, and even Naofumi found it a bit odd, certainly they might have been simply not as well versed in games as each of them thought but it seemed unlikely that titles as famous as what the two of them seemed to imply would be unheard of by the other two.

At this point, the door opened and the last of the Heroes walked in.

Black was an anomaly in a lot of ways. He was European or American, he was taller than all of them and fairly well built and unlike them, he wasn't a student. He also didn't seem to be an Otaku and was the least excited about this whole thing.

"Good evening." said Adrian, "My apologies for coming in late, but Andre had some interesting things to say."

"It's cool." said Naofumi," Did you get the info you wanted?"

Naofumi had to admit he was kind of curious.

"No, I did not." he said, a cold expression on his face, " It would seem that there is no known method to return home and that the ceremony they used to summon us is not understood in the slightest. They pretty much summoned us after trying nearly ten times for the past month or so. They don't know much about the weapons or how we are selected or even what happen if the waves are stopped."

He took a deep breath, "As far as I can tell we are stuck here."

Naofumi had to wince at the anger in Black's last statement. Clearly, the man was not happy to be here, truthfully Naofumi didn't understand the man, this was a miracle, an opportunity that no one could have ever expected.

"Hey man, do you know anything about a game called dimension wave or Emerald online?" asked Motoyasu hopefully, ignoring the other man's mood.

Black walked towards one of the empty chairs and sat down before considering the questions for a moment, his answer was disappointing but expected, "No I have not. But I have to admit that I am hardly a gamer, the game may exist and I have simply not heard of it. Why do you ask?"

"Itsuki and Motoyasu said that those games were like this World." said Naofumi, "And I have read a book about this place."

"Interesting. I haven't had any exposure to anything similar to this place. I have read some novels with a similar concept, a Hero being summoned to another world but the worlds were quite different from these. The concept is popular, so I suppose I had simply not read something similar and missed the book or something." he replied, "Perhaps this knowledge is part of the reason for your summoning."

"Could be, but that doesn't explain why you guys haven't heard of the most famous online game in decades," said Motoyasu.

"It doesn't but I suspect it may be because we are from parallel earths," said Black.

"What?!" said the other three Heroes.

Naofumi had to admit the man-made a bit of sense. But they still needed to confirm it. When he expressed the idea, the other three nodded.

"Okay, who is the current Prime Minister of Japan?" said Motoyasu.

"I don't know any presidents of Japan Motoyasu," Adrian said with an amused smile. " But I think you three will find different answers."

And indeed they did, Naofumi had never even heard of the names the other heroes mentioned. When the continued with more global things lie wars or major events, Naofumi found that they had nothing in common.

"I believe that we have sufficient proof to conclude that we are from alternate Earths," said the Sword Hero.

"Yeah"

"I guess you're right."

"Seems so," said Naofumi nodding.

"It seems that you two probably have a great deal of information on this world that we do not." noted Adrian, his tone calm, and Naofumi had to agree with him, compared to these two gamer pros who seemed to know everything about this world and this absurd guy who was always chill he was at a massive disadvantage, he needed to learn more,"Would you mind sharing some basics with us? It would help us survive."

Their hesitation was as plain as day, but in the end, they capitulated.

"Alright guys just let me handle it." said Motoyasu," Now the waves are events with raid bosses at the end of it, each boss normally has its gimmick but as long as you've got a decent party and have level enough it's pretty easy to beat. There are tons of adds and you can get a lot of XP if you kill them but they don't matter much. It's best to just avoid them."

He continued from there with the occasional interruption from Itsuki. He spoke about the bosses, the fact that the waves bosses had levels that went up by like 15 levels each time and that if you failed to beat a wave boss then an event starts up where you have to fight the adds that you missed out on.

Naofumi was a little stunned at the sheer amount of information that Motoyasu knew about, he felt his gratitude surge at the man's help. Itsuki knew a lot but he wasn't sharing much but Motoyasu was getting into it.

He then started about the weapons, "Now Black your Sword is pretty much standard DPS, high attack, medium speed but shitty defence. You need a healer but if you've got one you're pretty much set."

He then turned towards Naofumi," You're a Shielder. It's got great defence and in the early game you're pretty much unkillable but in the late game, you're kinda screwed."

Naofumi was a little stunned at the sudden negative turn but Motoyasu continued," In the mid-game the enemies get a lot stronger and so they began to get past your defence but in the late game their attack is high enough that your best shot is to attack hard first, Shielders tend to be shit at attacks. In EMO almost no one took Shielders after the first month or so, I even heard that they were planning on deleting the class."

Naofumi had to interrupt here," Does the Shielder have an evolved class or something?" he asked a little desperate, he needed something!

"Nah man, the advanced classes were pretty shit too. Took way to long to get there, and it's pretty much the same thing just intensified. All defence and no attack. Like I said shit class." he said casually like he hadn't just told Naofumi that he had drawn the worst weapon.

Itsuki nodded at Motoyasu's words," Indeed. Dimension Wave had much the same scenario when it came to the Shield wielders. They were decent enough tanks in the early game but the difficulty curve for them was insane later on, most only took the class if they wanted an impossible challenge."

Naofumi felt his heart wither. This was bad, really bad. He looked at his Shield, and had to admit that it made a little sense, hadn't he been the one to think that a Shield wasn't really a weapon at all?

But! That didn't change a thing, so what if he could not attack? He would have party members to help him with that! He would keep them safe, he was the Shield Hero after all, and they would attack for him.

Black's voice brought him out of his little inspiration session, "It does not seem wise to dismiss the only defensive armament we have among the four of us. The ability to damage is all well and good but surely there are enemies where defensive capability is critical as well?"

Naofumi felt a surge of gratitude at the older man at that. He didn't seem to be the type of guy to throw around empty words, so he must believe what he said. And it did make sense, after all, who heard of a pure DPS raid teams, they needed healers and tanks as well.

"Nah man, the Shielder is pretty shitty, there are better tanks, better healers and way better classes. No offence man," Motoyasu said turning towards Naofumi," You got a shitty deal with that shield."

"It's fine," said Naofumi, with confidence he didn't feel," If I can't attack I can at least support my party members right? I'm still a hero and this is a Legendary weapon, I'm sure it will work out."

He wasn't certain who he was trying to convince, these three or himself.

The pitying looks he got from Motoyasu and Itsuki did not help. Black, on the other hand, was simply silent with an expressionless face, he was clearly thinking. Probably about how useless the Shielder was.

Naofumi felt a surge of envy, this guy didn't even want to be here, but he still had a damn good weapon, from what Motoyasu said the guy had the best DPS weapon of all of them.

"I don't think it would be wise to assume that our weapons will follow all the same patterns as the games." Black said after a long moment, "I'm guessing that in those games all players had access to the same classes?" he asked, and waited until Motoyasu and Itsuki nodded," Then it would seem that we have access to some special versions of the same classes given that these are meant to be Legendary weapons. It seems likely that we shall have access to more things than just what the games provide. Maybe the Shield can be useful here even if it was worthless in the game."

Naofumi felt his envy turn to shame. Here he was thinking shit about the guy and he goes and defends him, but more than that he felt a little spark of hope, Black was right, the Shield was shit in the game, but that hardly meant that it was useless here.

Motoyasu scoffed at that, "Dude, everything about the weapons is pretty much the same as the game, it's nice that you're trying to help Naofumi out here, but the fact is that the Shield is a pathetic weapon. Hell, it barely counts as one since it can't attack at all just defend and counter."

Black shrugged at that," I don't say things simply to be nice." he stated, his tone calm, "But you may be correct, only time shall tell for certain."

The conversation stalled here as they were called for dinner. But Naofumi felt his excitement surge again as they got up to follow the steward.

So what if he had a shield?

He was going on an adventure!


	4. Chapter 4

Adrian took a careful look around the bedroom he had been assigned and felt a small smile emerge as he noticed a number of potentially useful items. The items were normal ones, like a number of candles, some incense sticks, some sort of odd magical lights, a number of different fabrics and some furniture but those things along with the objects he had in his pockets from his homeworld would be what he needed tonight for the testing.

Adrian knew that in this world the only asset he had that could not be easily turned against him was the Legendary Holy Sword, he did want to learn magic but that would require help, in contrast, the Sword was something that he could use right away, and all it needed was to absorb some material and level up, something that no one was likely to stop him from doing.

Truly he was grateful that the Sword prevented people from enslaving him with a cursed seal, it was the number one thing he was most grateful about, otherwise he doubted that these people would hesitate to bind and enslave him so that he did their bidding, no doubt an obedient pet would be preferable to a free hero.

Adrian shook his head slightly as he walked towards the unlit candles, now was not the time for such contemplation, he needed to test out his Holy Sword to check if it functioned as the Legendary Weapons did in the Light Novel, the knowledge he had of the LN was one of his only advantages in this world, he could not afford to wait to test if that knowledge was accurate, until now all signs pointed to the fact that save for himself everything was the same but who knew how many differences there truly were.

So he broke the candles in half and pulled out the wick, then he took some of the wax and offered it to the gem embedded in his Sword. For a moment, nothing happened, and Adrian felt despair seep through, if the Sword could not even perform a basic absorption then his knowledge was completely invalid, but then the wax began to glow and he felt his Sword react, in an instant the wax vanished and in the corner of his vision he saw a notification.

_**Wax Absorbed.  
Conditions Met: Wax Sword Unlocked.**_

Adrian felt like laughing, only the certainty that people were no doubt spying on him stopped him from doing so. He quickly opened up his status menu fully and focused on the weapon tree. Instantly the massive three-dimensional structure filled his vision and Adrian focused on the flashing icon indicating the newly unlocked sword.

The weapon tree seemed to fade from view and a new screen opened up in front of his, it held the details of the Wax Sword.

_**Wax Sword (unmastered)(0/10) : Lv 1 0.00% **_**+0**  
_**Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +1  
Equip Skills: Moulding 1  
Special Ability: None**_

A moment of focus on each term in the help menu clarified things, everything was as the norm in the light novel. The level indicated the amount that had been boosted by using the energy gauge, the energy gauge filled up the more the weapon was kept active. Adrian could also boost the weapon using items as shown by the enchantment section and the (0/10) and the +1, though it seemed to need different types of items for each system.

Adrian had no monster parts so he could not test out the status enchantments but the fact that he had the option was incredibly reassuring. Adrian thought for a moment while focusing on the screen and moved the gem of the sword near all the wax pieces, it slowly absorbed all of it and then gave a notification.

_**Wax Absorbed.**_

He focused on this Wax that was available in the items menu and then tried to think about the Wax Sword…...it took a moment but the option popped up, he allowed the assimilation to occur and then noted the Wax sword again. 

_**Wax Sword (unmastered)(1/10) : Lv 1 0.00% +1  
Energy Level 5/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +2;Speed +1  
Equip Skills: Moulding 1  
Special Ability: None**_

The change caught him off guard a little. He had expected a small result but this was quite impressive, the stat boost of the attack and speed had gone up by one. The amount of wax was quite large compared to the original amount but it seemed that simply absorbing more of given materials was enough to upgrade something.

Adrian quickly shattered a few more candles and then offered the wax to the sword. A moment of manipulating his menus and then he saw the results.

It was honestly stunning.

_**Wax Sword (Mastered) (3/10) : Lv 1 0.00% +2  
Energy Level 28/100  
Rarity: Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +3; Speed +2  
Equip Skills: Moulding 2  
Special Ability: None**_

_**Conditions Met: Wax Sword II Unlocked (Level Locked. Required Level: 4)**_

5 candles worth of wax was enough to both provide a new Sword as well as upgrade the old one. The only problem, the level requirement for the Wax Sword II was high enough that he couldn't even open it up. Level 4 was a trivial thing however, what mattered was this, Adrian had a method to almost casually master weapons as well as gain stat boosts. Certainly, +3 attack and +2 speed was nothing game-breaking but imagine a hundred swords with even just a +1 in attack, that was more than enough to multiply his current attack by 20!

Considering that he could unlock new swords quite casually, this was an amazing method, combined with status enchantments, and the boosts from levelling, it was quite likely that stats would not be a problem as long as he could keep on unlocking and upgrading new swords. That was one less thing to worry about. But the problem was skills. Adrian had no way to know if a given sword would provide him with good skill, his only chance was to just keep trying, and such a random method was honestly irritating, he needed a more secure and accurate method than trial and error. Unfortunately, he saw no such method, all he could do was try and see if there was a pattern in which swords gave him skills once he had a decent collection of them.

He let out a sigh and then headed towards the bed, he sat down on the surface after removing all the accessories he had carried with him all day, nothing much, just his wallet, keys, and his phones.

Adrian took a long look at them. They were all reminders of so many events. He could see the small tear in his wallet which his sister had inflicted trying such a cool design on it and failed, he could see a small crack on his older phone when his brother had dropped it while playing a game, Adrian could remember how scared Ethan had been, the child had tried to hide the phone from him. At that time he had been frustrated and a little angry, but now, further away from them than ever before all he felt was despair. He had no idea what was going on there, was time effectively frozen? Did time pass faster there, or would he be able to return home with them not even realizing it? Or would they find him gone and try to find him only to fail because he was in another bloody dimension!

Adrian's despair gave in to rage, it was a slow-burning one, he had felt scared and worried from the moment he had realized what had occurred, he had tried to focus on his next task, on his survival, on the story he had read so that he could keep thinking. But looking at these objects, at just how alien they were to this world it reminded him again that these bastards had kidnapped him just to throw him at a horde of monsters and then the fucking summoner had the gall to look guilty when telling him that they didn't have a way to send him back.

He was going to make them suffer. Maybe he would throw them into an arena with some monsters, then if they won, put them in a cage and then make fight another, and keep this up until they die. Would the bloody King regret summoning them if he did this to the man and his family? Adrian didn't know but he suspected that he would have fun trying.

Adrian felt like laughing when he realized just how pointless his thoughts were. Right now he was nothing. He had no contacts, limited information from a light novel whose validity he was uncertain off, surrounded by people who would take his head off at the first command and weaker than even a child of this world. Revenge fantasies were worthless, what he needed was power.

He took a long look at the items strewn about in front of him while leaning against the headboard of the bed, his sword still in hand. They were reminders of his past, of his world, of his family but they were better suited to be used to gain power.

He kept one of the phones aside. The newest one, but fed the items to his Sword one by one, keeping his family in mind. He would keep his newer phone intact, it had some pictures of his family if he managed to figure out how to charge it, it would act as motivation. The rest of the objects were worth nothing. He saw a few notifications flared forth in the periphery of his vision.

_**Condition Met: Currency Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Currency Storage Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Leather Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Communication Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Key Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Ring Sword Unlocked  
Condition Met: Silicon Sword Unlocked...**_

There were more than a dozen, most from the components of the phone but some from the bills and coins he had put in. Then he got off his bed and roamed around his room, absorbing various materials from the objects around him, a whole candle, some thread from the curtains, feathers from the pillows and fragments of the mattress, and even three types of wood that he scraped off using his sword from the furniture. He even took a bit of the wall.

It was rude and probably something that his observers found odd but frankly, he didn't care. Eccentricity was hard to model and he had no reason to bother with their opinion unless it would cause him trouble.

Right now what he needed was strength. He needed power or he would never be free of these bastards and he would never get back home. And as he saw his periphery fill up with notifications of more swords being unlocked, he felt a cold satisfaction rise up, he would not stay under the thumb of these fools for long.


	5. Chapter 5

Adrian felt like there was electricity running through his body, a nervous tension that did not seem to fade. He had done all that he could, planned to the best of his capability and unlocked as many Sword forms as possible. Even now he had unlocked five sword forms out of the ten which could be unlocked at level 1 and managed to get his attack stat nearly doubled from the initial value despite not levelling up even once but the feeling that this would not be enough did not fade.

He tried to control his breathing, carefully regulating it while they had breakfast, and waited for the summon. Today was an important day, depending on his growth today, and how well he performed, who his allies were and how much they could be trusted he could plan for the future. For now, the amount of confirmed information he had was pathetic and that limited the amount of planning he could do.

Soon enough, the call to assemble in the throne room came, and the four of us went forth, Adrian could see that the other three Heroes were eager, but Adrian's attention went to Naofumi, the boy was nearly skipping, a silly smile on his face.

His sheer joy was like a dagger in Adrian's heart, for the first time since he had arrived in this world he felt genuine pity for the boy who was about to have his dream shattered until it warped him into a cruel man due to simple necessity. Adrian had never really liked Naofumi as a character but now looking at a real person who was about to be falsely accused of rape and have his life ruined he felt an immense frustration build up. It was incredibly unfair what was going to happen to him, but Adrian saw no way around it.

Certainly, he could try something to prevent the rape accusation scenario, perhaps call the four heroes for a post hunting drink or something to have obvious witnesses that could not be easily bought or silenced. Hell if he was willing to take a risk, it was entirely possible that Adrian's presence alone could potentially short circuit the Princess's whole plot but that would not stop the basic fact that the reason why Naofumi had been treated so poorly and the accusation was believed so easily was due to the Church of Three Heroes and the widespread belief about the so-called Shield Demon. The whole rape accusation was just an excuse, perhaps the King believed it, perhaps he did not, but the fact of the matter was that the whole kingdom was predisposed to hate the Shield Hero. If he did manage to stop the whole rape accusation event, then what was he supposed to do if something else came up? He could hardly stay around Naofumi 24/7.

Though this whole situation was nearly impossible for Adrian to solve right now, if he let things be and Naofumi got accused of rape, then, in theory, the canon events should occur. In practice, however, there was no reason for such a thing to occur. Say the Blacksmith who helped him chooses not to, or the Slave trader decides not to visit Naofumi, or Naofumi decides to avoid the Slave trader, or perhaps if the Slave Trader decides that Naofumi should be enslaved as it could make him some money, or if Naofumi decides to take a different slave rather than Raphtalia and this slave is far less capable or not as loyal or something and thus Naofumi is not powerful enough during the Wave and dies, or something happens and he unlocks the Curse Series Earlier and goes on some sort of rampage without Raphtalia to stop him from giving into his anger.

There were so many possibilities, so many ways for this to get worse, that he could see no easy solution.

He tried to think of something, feeling almost absurdly guilty of spending the last night contemplating his weapon rather than the Shield Hero, but they reached the large doors before he could think of a good plan.

He shook his head, trying to refocus, now was not the time for distraction. He would have to figure something out later.

His second look at the room just confirmed what his first look had informed him off. Very elegant and a show of power. He didn't waste a second more on it and took a look at the future party members arranged in front of the throne. He recognized none of them save for Malty who was quite obvious thanks to her uniquely red hair. She was quite beautiful but his knowledge of her tendency to manipulate and ruin men just made that beauty one of her weapons and all he felt when he looked at her was a desire to run his sword through her.

The remaining members of the group looked very well dressed. He could tell little to nothing about them, save for some general information which was supplied by his Status magic. Adrian felt on edge as they stared at him and began to slow his breathing deliberately in an attempt to calm down.

Adrian and the others bowed to the King, and the man spoke after he nodded in acknowledgement to their bow, "As we discussed yesterday, I have called for other to assist you in your journey. My call did not go unheaded and these future heroes of our nation have agreed to join your cause."

Adrian wanted to laugh, he would not pretend to be able to guess all the interests gathered here in the form of these twelve people but he could at least make vague guesses. The Church, the Royal family and some noble houses, either those favoured by the Church or the King would certainly be here. If the Adventurers guild was powerful enough they too could have a representative as could any powerful merchant families.

"Now then, brave adventurers, go forth and choose the Legendary Hero you will travel with," Aultcray concluded.

They all moved forward in unison, and for a moment there was a little bit of chaos, but the aftermath was just a little different from what Adrian had expected.

Malty Melromarc was standing behind him rather than Motoyasu.

The rest of the distribution was similar to the story, no one stood behind Naofumi, Motoyasu had five people, Itsuki had four and I had three including the Princess.

Adrian frowned wondering why she had chosen him, was there some difference between this story and canon, did he simply look to be a better target than Motoyasu? Perhaps on account for how much Motoyasu had spoken of yesterday regarding the world while Adrian had pretended ignorance.

This was a massive deviation from his expectations, clearly, he would have to be a lot more careful with his assumptions if he was already seeing deviations from his expected events.

"Sir!" said Naofumi after looking around in despair," This is…"

Aultcray looked nearly completely apathetic, and simply turned to his advisor and said," I did not anticipate such a thing," his voice reached us loud and clear.

The minster simply shrugged and said," He is not very popular, is he? Perhaps it is due to those unfortunate rumours."

Naofumi looked stunned as the murmurs and short laughs began all around them. Adrian couldn't help but think that Naofumi might just be better off with none of these people, after all, at least he wouldn't be surrounded by spies or scum.

"It seems that there are whispers around the castle. They are saying that among the four heroes, the Shield is without a doubt the weakest." said Aultcray, sounding quite sympathetic," It seems to have influenced the selection process."

Naofumi seemed to be stunned, Motoyasu poked him in the side with an elbow and whispered something to him, which moved Naofumi out of his surprised state and he turned towards Motoyasu fully and said," Don't you think this is horrible?!"

The spear wielder shuffled a bit awkwardly but said nothing, Naofumi read him loud and clear and turned towards Adrian," Black, come on man, I mean you can see I need some help right?"

Adrian frowned but nodded, there was no simple solution here, for reasons that Naofumi simply wasn't aware of, so he turned to his potential party members and said,"I would be grateful if one of you would join Naofumi, any rumours spread about him are merely rumours and nothing more, I am quite ignorant about this world myself and you were kind enough to join me, so I would request that one of you join him so that he can grow faster and the Waves can be fought more efficiently."

Their reactions were quite interesting but what was truly surprising was how Malty looked away from meeting my eyes, and gave no indication of moving towards Naofumi. Adrian had a sinking feeling as the other girl in his party looked a little startled but looked towards the balcony and didn't move while the male simply looked away from him. But Malty's lack of movement was the stunning factor, Adian had made that little speech for a number of reasons but the main was to simply get Malty out of his party for the moment, it was a convenient opening and he had been certain that she would take it if she wished to start her plan to frame Naofumi but she had ignored it.

Naofumi cursed and then turned to Itsuki," I suppose it would be fair to split them evenly, with each of us getting three. But then again, it's not gentlemanly to deny them once they've made their decision." the boy said, and most of the room, some of which had been glaring or looking surprised at Adrian after he had spoken, nodded at once.

Naofumi looked like he was going to cry, he was looking at everyone in the room, his face slowly becoming more and more desolate. Adrian felt a small fury build up as the whole court seemed amused at his humiliation, these people truly were scum, they had summoned a man from his home and then saw fit to insult him in such a manner for no reason save for petty discrimination.

"Are there any here who would throw their lot in with Mr Naofumi?" asked Aultcray.

The whole room was still as if simply moving would condemn them to become the Shield Hero's companion.

"Very well. I suppose there is no way around it. Mr Naofumi, you'll have to recruit others to accompany you while you are travelling. Each month, I will supply all of you with the necessary funds for your journey, though in compensation for today's events, Naofumi's first payment will be higher than the others. He shall receive 800 silver while the other Heroes shall receive 500 silver."

We received the funds and the King said something, Adrian answered almost on auto pilot while his mind ran forward, trying to figure out why there had already been a deviation. For some reason Malty had chosen to join his party and stay there, why had she avoided going to Naofumi to frame him? Adrian had always assumed that the whole rape accusation had been a plot between the Church and the Princess where she would frame the Shield Hero and ensure that he was ostracized in exchange for their support, or perhaps a favour from her to maintain her relationship with the church.

And yet if that was the case and it truly was a plot then it would not have been derailed due to his presence. The plot was to accuse the Shield Hero, as he was meant to be the Shield Demon, and the whole avoiding Naofumi during this party assignment indicated that the bias against he Shield Hero was alive and well, so this was not an alternate universe where there was discrimination against the Sword Hero and Malty planned to frame him instead.

Which meant that for some reason he was the better target for Malty's goals and if the church was working with her or using her then he was a better pawn for the church.

Suddenly all his plans needed to account for this new factor. This world truly was hell, but perhaps this would lead to a kinder outcome for Naofumi, the question was whether that was worth his destruction.


	6. Chapter 6

As Adrian and his party members walked out of the castle into the sun, he couldn't help but feel confused and more than a little worried.

Malty Melromarc was a manipulative, cruel and petty little monster in the Light Novel, Adrian supposed that things could be different here. This world could be some sort of alternate universe where she wasn't utter scum but he was not going to bet on it. In all likelihood, the woman who had been the doom of both Naofumi and Motoyasu in the original story, had decided that he was her first target.

He would not pretend to understand why she had chosen to ignore Naofumi, who should have been an ideal target, but the result was that Adrian wasn't certain what to do anymore. His initial thought towards his party had been to simply use them for the moment and then simply ask them to leave, after all, they were unlikely to cause too much trouble if he kicked them out once he had levelled enough and had tested his Sword out to the point that he was confident in his survival. After that, he could simply find party members of his own who were not guaranteed spies or people with conflicting loyalties.

But Malty was a bloody princess, and even worse she was a doted upon by the petty little usurper who sat on the throne, Adrian would not pretend to know the precise consequences of kicking her out but if he did not do so from a position of power, he may very well end up dead.

Being the Sword Hero should be a protection of some form but if they were willing to demonize Naofumi and risk several other nations, who worshipped all four Heroes or the Shield specifically, declaring war on them in the middle of a planetary scale disaster, then he was not going to bet on rational action from the Church or the Royals.

So here he was stuck with a psychopath for at least a few weeks, worse these were the most critical few weeks that could make or break his future. Adrian shook his head as he realized that he had utterly ignored the other two.

He took a look at them as they walked behind him, politely silent, for the minute or so as they left the castle grounds. Once they left the gate he started a conversation, "Alright, I suppose we should discuss our plans for the day. But before that, I'd like to have all your names and your specialities in combat as well as why you choose to join me."

The only male of the three, nodded immediately, "Understood sir, I am Bellamy, a member of the Holy Order of the Church and I specialize in Light Magic and healing. I am considered a prodigy by the order and was fortunate enough to be permitted to join the Legendary Heroes on their quest to save the world." He bowed deeply here," I am truly honoured to be in the presence of the Saint of the Sword."

Adrian had to blink at that, the implications of what he had said and the opportunity it provided, "I apologize for interrupting," he said, raising his hand to ask Malty to stop as she had just been about to speak," But are you saying that the Four Heroes are worshipped in Melromarc."

A small moment of hesitation was obvious, as the man considered how to answer, then he said," The Heroes are indeed worshipped sir, but only the three Saint Heroes are worshipped. The three heroes are those who are blessed by the one true Lord that watches over us all and protects us from harm. As such you and your compatriots are those who are closest to the true Lord."

He bowed again, "As I said, it is truly an honour to serve with an Avatar of the Lord himself."

"I highly doubt that I will be able to live up to such a lofty vision Bellamy," Adrian said, feeling very, very odd as the older man in front of him looked at him with utter reverence,"I am many things but I very much doubt that I am the avatar of a God."

"Your humility is truly a pleasure to behold Sir, but the Sword you wield is a sign of divine power, as you unseal more and more of your divine power through the Sword, I believe that you shall realize the truth for yourself. You are an avatar of the Lord. There is no doubt of the fact!" he proclaimed.

At this point, even Malty and the blonde girl were looking a little bit disquieted, and all of them had stopped walking.

Adrian started moving again and quickly moved the conversation along, he would think about the fact that he had a fanatic devoted to the idea of his being an avatar of a God later," Miss, I apologize for the delay, please continue."

For once he wanted to have this psychopath speak, what an insane world he was in. He had to get the hell out of here.

"Thank you Sir Black, My name is Myne Sophia, or at least that is my adventurer name," she said, a truly beautiful smile on her face," my true name is Princess Malty Melromarc. It is an honour to stand by your side as you defend my country. And I am an expert fire mage and a skilled swordswoman.."

"That is a surprise Princess," he said, trying to frame his argument, he needed to see how she reacted to him "but is it wise to allow the next ruler to the nation risk herself on the front lines? I do not doubt your ability to fight if you have chosen to join me, but surely the risks of the waves cannot be fully eliminated?"

"I am certain that you can protect me Sir Hero, indeed there is no doubt in my mind that you can ensure that both the waves are defeated and that we are all kept safe," she said, coming a little closer and holding his hand in both of her own while they continued walking.

Adrian suppressed the urge to pull his hand out of her grasp, and instead gave it a little squeeze and pushed it away after that, he was starting to realize just how much of a burden dealing with this nightmare was going to be, "Thank you for the compliment but I am merely an amateur at combat, and while I would love to say that your protection is certain I can guarantee no such thing. Are you certain that you still wish to risk your life against the Waves?"

"Sir Hero, please do not doubt my courage any further," she said firmly, a poor attempt to get me to feel guilty about insulting her. But an attempt that would have worked if I didn't have information that no one in this world should have had.

"My apologies Princess. Thank you for your support." Adrian said, deciding right there that she would have to die or be removed as soon as possible, a dragon eating her, or her falling down a mountain after being pushed by a monster sounded perfect, and destroying her corpse would be easy, his Sword would be able to absorb it.

"I am Andrea, Sir Black. Skilled defender, healer and at boosting other party members." the last girl said, her voice was quiet and she went silent after her short introduction. Then she started again, " I choose to join you because you were the Hero with the least number of people in your party."

Adrian had to wonder about the three people he had gotten in his party, had Ren's party members been this….quirky. A religious fanatic, a seductive psychopath and a girl who was far too blunt. He was starting to rethink his idea of using them for the first month. If these guys were bad at combat he was going to have to risk kicking them out and going for other options.

However, both of them had given him some pretty valuable information almost inadvertently. After all both Bellamy and Andrea had made it pretty clear that neither of them gave the Shield Hero any importance at all. That was something he could exploit later.

Adrian smiled here and hoped it didn't look as false as it was, "Excellent, my name as you all know is Adrian Black, and I would be grateful if you all called me by name. After all, you all are willing to risk your lives against an apocalypse at my side, it would be rather pathetic to insist on formality after that."

Adrian was starting to feel happy that he had gone into retail hell in high school, he hadn't had to lie this much in years.

"Of course Adrian," said Malty, a sultry smile on her lips, "Please address me as Malty or Myne, whichever you prefer."

The other two were far more direct.

"Yes, Sir Hero!"

"Understood."

No two guesses as to who said what. This was going to be a nightmare. 

Preparation for the hunting took nearly two hours and 150 silver but it was time and money well spent.

Adrian hummed a little tune under his breath as he changed his sword form to an Iron Sword. It was nothing exceptional, just a common iron sword made by a blacksmith, the only special part was that he was the same blacksmith who had supported Naofumi. So why was he so very happy? Simple he had just tested out his weapon copy more than 50 times in the past two hours. In some cases, he didn't get anything new, turns out that using it on two Iron Swords simply doesn't do anything but he did get a huge increase in his arsenal even if he could only use the Iron Sword at level one.

He was wearing a simple chainmail armour that increased his defence rating by about 2 dozen points effectively multiplying it and he was currently feeding his sword some of the items he had instructed his party members to buy while he had been running around copying swords.

Malty, Andrea and Bellamy had been quite obedient. It was a bit of a surprise to see the bitch so very willing to jump to his tune but he supposed she was still setting him up for the fall, best make as much use of her as possible before he was forced to murder her.

He had gotten the three of them to buy some used or damaged tools from around town, the main reason was to get a few new forms for his sword, after all, Naofumi had gotten forms from things like ropes, pipes and pickaxes, who knew what useful stuff was hiding behind mundane objects? But the secondary reason was the image of Malty going around asking for second hand and broken shit with the ten silvers that he had given her. It was hilarious, he was probably going to pay for it but watching her smile while she was probably seething? Surprisingly satisfying.

Nonetheless, these two hours had been wonderful with a great many weapon forms being unlocked as the bags his party members had was slowly emptied. He was getting some looks from the crowd as he fed his sword but frankly this particular ability was pretty much universal, he was giving away little to nothing by doing this in public.

Now, however, was the time to go to the most important location in the city, it was a place that Adrian had delayed going to because he honestly hadn't been sure if it was wise to enter at this point but now after unlocking nearly a hundred swords in total before he even got a single exp point he was feeling a little better about his chances with the wave, even if more than ninety per cent were sealed off, by the time he was level 25 he would have all of them unlocked. So he would be going to the Dragon Hourglass. A timer in his vision would be a wonderful motivator, nothing like the promise of death to push a person forward. Plus he wanted to unlock the teleportation Sword.

That particular sword was critical to a dozen of his plans, the moment he fully unlocked that sword and boosted it as much as possible, he was going to have his options multiply.

So the four of them walked towards the massive tower where the hourglass was kept, and truthfully just massive did not do the tower justice. That particular tower could be seen from anywhere in town and as they walked closer it simply seemed to loom over them like it was endless.

Adrian had to admit this was damn impressive for a medieval world, he assumed that magic made such construction easier and more practical, otherwise he couldn't even begin to imagine how they made this thing.

The inside was incredibly well lit and very well decorated, gentle music seemed to flood the room from every direction and the smell of incense was present subtly, the atmosphere was truly quite wonderful.

It was quite sad that the place was the headquarters of a cult.

A nun noticed them the moment they walked in, she walked up to them calmly at first and then with some haste once she noticed the sword.

"Saint Hero," she said with a bow, " Please be welcome here. We are honoured by your presence and that of your companions"

"Thank you," said Adrian," I was hoping to see the hourglass if it is possible and hopefully get some of the sand inside it."

"Of course Sir. I shall accompany you to the Dragon Hourglass right away, but you may have to wait a moment for the sand sir, we have some gathered but it is in a secure room, we shall have it for you in no time at all."

She was looking increasingly nervous as she finished her sentence as if making him wait for five minutes was the end of the world or something.

"It's no problem. Please take your time."

"Thank you. Now, please follow me, sir."

It took them about five minutes following a rather convoluted path to get to the hourglass, but when they did reach their goal, it honestly stunned Adrian.

He had known intellectually that he was in a world with magic, the Sword stuck to him that was capable of absorbing literal tons and transforming was pretty good proof but for the first time, he was looking at something that _felt _magical.

The hourglass was truly massive, but what was stunning was that he could feel _something _from it, it was like a blind man suddenly realizing he could see, Adrian had no way to describe what he was feeling but it left him in awe.

The thought struck by lightning,_this had not been made by humans_, he didn't know why he was so certain about that or where that thought had come from but it was true, he knew that for certain.

"...Adrian, Sir Adrian." he heard, it was distant however like he was hearing someone speak underwater, then he felt his shoulder shake and he looked to see who it was. Bellamy looked concerned, "Sir are you, all right? You...you just stopped moving sir."

Adrian shook his head, trying to clear it, but it didn't help, "I'm not sure what happened, it felt like...something just woke up or something. I don't know. Let's just get this done and get out of here, I need to think about this."

He lifted his sword and focused on it and the hourglass, feeling quite nervous about the massive structure now, but no problems emerged, his Sword took on a glow from its gem for a moment before a beam of light struck the Dragon hourglass lighting it up, then a time began to countdown on my status screen.

_**33:01:34:21**_

33 days, 1 hour, 34 minutes and 21 seconds. That was how much time he had to prepare for an apocalypse.

It was about time that he got started. He impatiently waited for the sand, it took about five more minutes but a nun bowed before him and handed it to him, once he received the red sand from her, his status screen immediately identified it as

_**Dragon Hourglass Sand (Super Rare)**_

He took a small pinch of it and tried to absorb it and while the sword did absorb it, it didn't unlock anything but once he absorbed the whole thing he got the message.

_**Requirements Met: Portal Sword Unsealed (Level Lock: Required Level 50)**_

Adrian turned after confirming that the process had worked and began to walk out after nodding in thanks to the nun, who looked ecstatic and bowed deeply in response, to the three people he was stuck with, he said," Let's go. We don't have time to waste."

He had to get to level 50 as soon as possible. It was his best chance at surviving.


	7. Chapter 7

The day was truly a beautiful one. Lush green fields all around interrupted only by the occasional massive trees, a calming wind what gently moved, and despite it being nearly an hour after noon the heat was barely felt.

Adrian, however, could not enjoy this amazing environment much, he was instead trying to get himself ready for his first fight against a monster.

He had done all he could think of and everything that his party members had suggested that he thought wise. He was equipped with some basic chainmail that had boosted his physical defence quite decently, his weapon, an Iron Sword, was the best one he could use at level one as it boasted both the best attack and a fairly decent speed rating and while not fancy the original weapon was a good quality one. Adrian also had potions at the ready, plus he had confirmed that Andrea and Bellamy could heal, so unless one of them wanted to betray him right at this moment he should be fine.

All the same, the idea of fighting while having Malty at his back made him quite nervous. So both to remove her from the board and to ensure much greater benefits for the day, he decided to go for a rather simple idea.

He waited until Andrea led them to a fairly large tree, it was equidistant from the forest that he could see nearby and the mountains, and it was close to the nearby plains as well, making it a good central spot, he nodded at her once she looked at him inquiringly, he had asked her to lead him to such a place when she had indicated that she was familiar with the geography of the area, and she had done a good job.

"All right everyone, since we don't have much time before the wave hits again, we need to be as efficient as possible. Our goals are simple, we need to kill a large number of monsters to level and gather a large variety of materials for me to upgrade the Legendary Sword." he paused here for a moment, " I need to experiment a bit to see the consequences of adding more and more of the same monster to the Sword to see if it helps or if simply focusing on one of each monster is enough. So our goal for the next half hour is to hunt down balloons. They should be the weakest monster here and the one in the greatest number," he looked to Andrea here, and she nodded once.

"We should aim for getting the remnants of at least 10 ballons each at a minimum but get as many as possible in the next half hour. If you encounter other monsters or see any useful herbs or plants that you can easily carry, take them as well." he continued, "We are going to split up into two teams, Andrea and I, and Bellamy and Malty. This way we have attack and defence balanced out. Let's begin immediately."

"Understood," said Andrea.

Malty had just frowned a little but when she caught him looking, she smiled and said," Of course Sir Hero."

Bellamy simply nodded before stating," Rest assured Sir Adrian we shall complete your orders."

"Good." he said with a smile," Then we shall see each other here in about half an hour."

He began walking at that, nodding when Malty wished him luck and then once they had covered some distance he asked Andrea," Where would you suggest we start?"

She considered that for a moment, before pointing in a direction, "Balloon swarms are common there. Likely to be the best place."

"Very well," he said, and tried to calm himself down, his heart was beating quite fast, he knew that he shouldn't be this nervous, these were mere balloons, the light novel had suggested that they were utter trash, as had the information that he had gotten from Andrea and his other party members and what the guild information counter had provided him.

Balloons had pathetic attack, worse defence and decent speed, for a normal level one. For Adrian who had already unlocked four weapon forms, three of which gave him a +2 for speed, and all of which gave him a +2 or in one case a +3 for attack. He should be fine. Probably.

Andrea's words proved to be true, they had scarcely walked for about 500 meters when balloons started to become common. He could see them from afar, moving about in the tall grass, and occasionally bouncing upwards.

He tried his best to focus on their movements, he had expected it to be a little difficult but oddly enough it was almost effortless, he had more than 10 balloons in his line of sight and yet he could track all of them easily. Was this an effect of boosting his speed stat? Enhanced perception to go with the speed? Or was this a side effect of the Legendary Sword boosting him physically? It could even be the fact that he had the Status magic now as an inhabitant of this world which pushed him past his previous limits.

He felt himself calm a little, he could see them coming.

"I shall draw their attention." said Andrea, her tone and demeanour shifting into something far calmer and far more serious, gone was the girl who had quietly followed his lead, instead here he could tell she expected obedience, "Please start your attack after that."

Andrea was as good as her word, she ran forward Sword and Shield in hand and then slammed the flat of her blade against her shield, making a loud sound that drew the attention of five nearby balloons.

Adrian watched carefully as the balloons moved towards her, their speed was still easy to perceive, and then bounced out of the grass, teeth first.

She killed one of them and then blocked the other two.

Adrian focused on those two that rebounded off her shield. She had angled the shield so that they were moving in his direction, so he repositioned himself slightly and intercepted one of them while it was still falling.

The Iron Sword cut through it like it was going through thin air.

Only the small bursting sound and the drizzle of orange fragments made him believe that he had hit something because he had felt no resistance at all when he had swung his weapon. But he didn't dwell on this for the second Balloon had already nearly hit the ground and would soon bounce in his direction.

For this one, he swung again, the balloons arc easily predicted, and once again it died, just as effortless as the first one, and fragments rained again.

That had been absurdly easy, Adrian could feel his tension drain out, especially when he saw five notifications that all said the same thing.

_**0.25 Exp Gained.  
0.25 Exp Gained.  
0.25 Exp Gained.  
0.25 Exp Gained.  
0.25 Exp Gained.**_

He shrugged the notifications off, and then looked to Andrea who had already killed her three. As expected of his highest level party member.

She was looking at him as well and he simply indicated that they continue, before kneeling and absorbing the fragments of the balloons he had killed, it wasn't enough to unlock the Sword Form but it was a start. Andrea started moving after she gathered her fragments into a small bag and then they moved forward.

Their hunt for balloons continued to be just as easy as the first time. The pattern of attack was identical. Andrea went in first, then they both worked together and killed them. Adrian found himself growing more and more comfortable with attacking and after a small amount of time, they had killed nearly 30 of these balloons, which combined with the Exp gain from his other two party members had been enough to level him up twice.

He had also managed to finally unlock the Orange Balloon sword and even the Red Balloon Sword, both offered nothing more than stat boosts but that was hardly a negative or an unexpected result.

The Balloon Swords were quite basic, he opened up his Status menu while they walked back to the tree once they had finished their time limit, Andrea acting as a watchdog.

_**Orange Balloon Sword (unmastered)(0/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +0  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +1  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

_**Red Balloon Sword (unmastered)(0/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +0  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts: Attack +2  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

Nothing special at all, Adrian continued adding the Balloon fragments that Andrea had gathered, able to see his inventory slowly filling up with Red and Orange fragments, the vast majority of the loot orange fragments, and once they reached the tree and found that their party members were not there, Adrian leaned against the tree and began to test out the fragments.

He brought up the Orange balloon Sword and focused on one of the fragments, absorbing it into the sword.

_**Orange Balloon Sword (unmastered)(0/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +0  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +1  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

No change at all. He kept this up until he saw a minor difference, but a significant one.

_**Orange Balloon Sword (Mastered)(0/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +1  
Energy Level 27/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Equip Boosts : Attack +1  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

It would seem that absorbing the same material into a sword boosted both the mastery of it and the Energy level needed to boost the Lv of the weapon. But this was not the end to his testing, now he tried to focus on increasing the number (0/15), the first slot filled in effortlessly going from 0 to 1 in an instant, barely consuming 1% of the total Orange Balloon fragments.

But to go from 1 to 2 and then 2 to 3 was a lot more difficult, taking 5% and then nearly 13 % of the original total. Worse he didn't seem to see any positive effects, the screen stayed the same, save for the number going from 0 to 3.

Hmm, the power-up effect should have done something….wait maybe it was simply not being displayed because he didn't think that the modification should be tried to think about the ratings of the weapons, which he normally saw on separate screens, and the damage bonuses, or even viewing the values in decimals, he focused on believing that it would be there, and after about half a minute, he reopened his Status Menu after closing it and found. 

_**Orange Balloon Sword (Mastered)(3/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +2  
Energy Level 55/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Status Rating  
Attack: 18  
Magic Attack:5  
Defence :0  
Magic Defence :0  
Speed: 9  
SP :0  
MP:0  
Stamina: 1**_

_**Damage Increase: 25% Against Balloon Type Enemies.  
Equip Boosts : Attack +1  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

Yes, there had been something hidden!

His mood plummeted there, just how many more things were hidden that he hadn't even considered, his knowledge of different empowerment methods was supposed to be his ace, if he couldn't make full use of it, then he was in trouble.

He considered the situation and then added more balloon fragments until the counter went from 3 to 4 and then observed the screen again. The difference was obvious.

_**Orange Balloon Sword (Mastered)(4/15) : Lv 1 0.00% +2  
Energy Level 90/100  
Rarity: Very Common  
Enchantments: None  
Status Enchantments: None**_

_**Status Rating  
Attack: 24  
Magic Attack:7  
Defence :0  
Magic Defence :0  
Speed: 9  
SP :0  
MP:0  
Stamina: 1**_

_**Damage Increase: 40 % Against Balloon Type Enemies.  
Equip Boosts: Attack +3  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: None**_

It seemed that using items to boost his weapons could boost basic stats of the weapon and increase the ability to damage different types of enemies, useful but situational and locked to a given weapon. While increasing the other marker allowed for basic equip boosts.

"Sir Hero!" he heard a voice, and his head snapped up, and he saw Malty and Bellamy, both of them holding a dozen monsters in total, in fact, he could see Bellamy's backpack nearly stuffed as well, just how much hunting had they done?!

Wait for a second, he was level three right now! He had been ignoring the notification about EXP gain for a while now, but he hadn't noticed that these two hand been hunting enough for him to level up again.

Bellamy dropped the monster corpses he had been holding onto on the ground carefully, and then removed his backpack and opened it to reveal, Balloon fragments and several herbs. Malty who had been holding onto her small pack and a monster corpse did the same.

"We have gathered the materials you requested Sir Hero, I hope we did alright," she asked, smiling softly.

Adrian moved out of his slight shock," You both did spectacularly. Thank you."

Bellamy said nothing but gave him a deep bow, while Malty's smile widened and said," It is an honour, Sir Adrian. Your thanks is a reward that is more than worth the effort."

She was laying it one thick, wasn't she? _What _exactly was her analysis of him that she thought such blatant flattery would work on him?

Still, he had to respond to their efforts, after all, no matter how much of a bitch she was, and how inevitable the betrayal there was limited harm in using her, for now, "Then I thank you again, please give me about five minutes before we start again, take a break, I just have a little more testing and then we can truly get started."

She nodded at that and he got back to work, time to test out status enchantments and then after some combat, he would try out the levelling scheme which the original Sword hero had tried.

Things were finally looking up.

"Eleven levels in a day." spoke Bellamy in a bit of a daze," Truly the Legendary Heroes are without equal."

Adrian had to wonder if it was truly that impressive, surely some rich nobles who could pay powerful adventurers would have them party up and then level up just as quickly?

He considered the situation for the moment and then voiced his previous thought. The answer surprised him as did the person who chose to answer.

"Sword hero is not familiar with the annoyance of levelling." said Andrea," It takes new adventurers many weeks to reach level 10, it is considered their first milestone. Eleven in one day? Very, very odd."

For the first time, he could hear some genuine annoyance in her voice, Adrian had to wonder how much she had to struggle to get to her first milestone.

"Indeed Sir Hero, your levelling is truly incredible, and I believe that Miss Andrea has failed to mention that our growth is quite incredible as well." said Bellamy finally breaking out of his daze," I never expected to grow two levels in such an area in a mere day."

Adrian shrugged at that, "You can thank the sword for that." he said," It seems to massively boost exp gain, I'll have to check if I can get the exact magnitude of the boost, if it is a variable number I'll have to make sure to work on optimizing it."

He knew the boost however, +900% was an absurd number to even contemplate, perhaps this was the reason Andrea had joined? After all, even with her being 28 levels above him at the start, she had gained a level as well. Malty who had the lowest level among the three had gone from 17 to 20 in just a day, and while a part of him hated the idea of empowering a woman who would likely go on to become an enemy he could not raise any suspicions just yet.

And where was Malty? Well she was walking right next to him, she spoke, clearly unwilling to let the conversation linger in Bellamy and Andreas hands, "I don't think that our dear Hero realizes just how amazing he is." she said, before holding onto his arm, pushing her breasts against him, "Sir Hero it is normal even for nobles with a lot of help to stop levelling after level 30 simply because of how much time it takes unless they plan to adventure or join the army, your ability is incredible"

Adrian smiled at her, but made a point to push her off his arm, she pouted in response," Interesting, but as I said the ability something the sword provided. But I think you all have a point, we have done very well today, let's celebrate shall we?" he said, "Any inn you can think off where we can get a good meal and a few drinks for say 20 silver?"

That was probably the most honest statement he had made since he was dragged to this world. The day truly had gone quite well, he knew that the levelling would slow from here but to reach level 12 in one day was unexpected, he didn't know how well Motoyasu and Itsuki had done, given their knowledge of farming spots and their larger parties they had probably done even better than him, but he was feeling content with his progress for now, hopefully his methods of enhancements would let him stay competitive despite their greater levels. Naofumi did concern him a little, he would have to find a way to check on him without drawing Malty's attention to him, somehow by luck or something more sinister Naofumi had been spared her malice for the moment, and while couldn't say that he cared or like Naofumi, no one deserved to have someone like her after him.

"I have the perfect place in mind Sir Adrian." asked Malty, "It's a wonderful place and it is a little difficult to get in, but I'm sure I can manage."

"Malty I presume you mean a fairly high-class place?" Adrian asked, "I would prefer a smaller place, I apologize if you were looking forward to going to your suggested place, but something a little simpler would be my preference." he turned towards, Bellamy and Andrea," Any suggestions?"

Bellamy nodded immediately, and enthusiastically mentioned, " Yes sir! There is an inn not far from here, it has food from all around the world. It is a favourite among my friends."

Andrea interrupted his sentence here," It is full of church idiots," she said, "they will go mad with the Sword Hero there. No peace or fun."

"Now see here, Miss Andrea.."

Adrian had to blink in surprise as Bellamy and Andrea began to argue right in front of him. He had not expected this from the super formal Bellamy or the stoic Andrea, it emphasized just how little he knew about these people.

He turned to look towards Malty who was annoyed. "Enough." she commanded, her voice cold," we shall go to an inn of my choosing." Her voice turned sweeter as she spoke to him," Adrian I believe I know a place that you may like, I can lead you there."

"Then let's go, we can sell some of the drop items later and then go to bed."

They started moving but Andrea and Bellamy continued their argument despite Malty's glare. Adrian was a little surprised to find that he was feeling a little relaxed. It was very odd that he would be so calm.

Then he realized just _why _all this felt so achingly familiar and his helpless rage returned.

Their argument, it reminded him of his siblings, how they mocked and teased each other about every topic under the sun, and then laughed about it later. Adrian tried to ignore the part of him that told him that he would never see them again.

It didn't work.


	8. Chapter 8 (Malty and Bellamy POV)

**Malty POV**

Malty winced as the carriage jumped again. She caught the Sword Hero's annoyed grimace as well but he said nothing and simply continued his boring conversation with the brat.

They were currently going towards the Black Forest, about half a day's journey from Castle Town, it was normally a restricted area because it was a little dangerous for most adventurers but mainly because it was an area that gave an incredible amount of EXP. Only the most well-connected adventurers would be permitted to go there, Malty had managed to get the pass for the place first with her father's influence, something that the Sword Hero had been suitably grateful for, but the irritating man's insistence that they get there before 8 in the morning and stay there for at least three days without leaving was infuriating, he didn't listen to a single word she said, and worse the brat and the fanatic agreed with him and left her looking like she was the one who was mad because she didn't want to spend three days in a damn dungeon.

Still she had expected the man to be a fool, and she was not very surprised to see that he was one indeed, after all, it would have been easier to have a comfortable journey had he not ordered the driver to make haste, and they would easily be able to journey through the forest even if they left every day and went to the nearby village. But just to be a little faster to get through to the depths of the forest the fool insisted on staying for days.

But this was a sacrifice she was willing to make to ensure that she gained her crown, her throne and her nation. The thought flared her fury even further, even now she couldn't help but clench her fists as she remembered her mother's cold look and Melty's arrogant one when the bitch had declared that Malty was no longer the heir and that Melty was now the heir to all her titles, but now she could feel satisfaction course through her, she had a legendary hero eating out of the palm of her hand, soon enough he would be begging for the slightest scraps she threw at him, a bit of a smile, a show of flesh, and the man would be waiting eagerly to be moulded by her into the tool she desired.

Truly men, even heroes, were nothing more than fools.

The best part was that Melty could never even hope to get a man for herself. Let alone a Hero, she was simply too immature. With a hero serving her she had no doubt that the throne would be hers for the taking, at this, she felt herself smile, and this particular brute seemed to like fighting and tearing into monsters for their blood and guts, making him even easier to use, all she had to do was throw him at monsters, making him stronger and putting him deeper and deeper into her debt.

The carriage which had been rushing along started to slow, she was not the only one who noticed as the Sword hero ended his conversation and looked out the small window, "Is this the place?" he asked.

"Yes Adrian, welcome to the Black Forest, one of the best places to level and encounter a variety of beasts on the planet," she said with a smile.

He just nodded, before starting to get up and gather up his bag and then walked towards the door, Malty suppressed her irritation at his rude behaviour, and moved to follow him. Once she was out of the carriage, she winced at the sudden shock of heat, the carriage had some protection from heat but she had not expected it to be this annoying.

Adrian had gone forward to the front of the carriage and was speaking to the driver who was ecstatic to be able to speak to a Hero, Malty wanted to laugh, that commoner would never be able to realize just how pathetic his dear heroes were. What surprised her was that the carriage started moving after Adrian returned to them.

Malty turned towards him, "Where is that man going? He is supposed to take us back to the castle!"

Adrian looked at her with one eyebrow raised," We are going to be in there for about three days or so if all goes according to plan, better he wait in the village inn than out here for no good reason." he turned towards the brat after this," Andrea, any last-minute advice regarding the forest?"

Malty ignored the fools and tried to calm down, this pest was getting on her nerves! That driver worked for her, it was his job to wait here for her, not rest in an inn while she had to sleep in a forest on top of filth.

"Alright, let's get going." said Adrian, his sword shifting forms to a vicious looking blade, that was slightly glowing,"Our goal, for now, is primarily just levelling up so that we can tackle the whole forest safely, but please note that materials are still critical, a minimum of at least one sample from every living thing in that forest."

He started walking, the brat moved to his side, going a little forward, while the church's little pet followed behind him. Malty let her irritation fade, she had known from the start that she would need to deal with fools, what Queen didn't? She could not allow these imbeciles ridiculous actions to alter her plans. Not when they were sure to succeed, she would not allow mere irritants like these to allow her to fail. So she followed staying to the back like they had discussed during the carriage ride here, prepared herself to use her magic, and drew her sword.

For nearly ten minutes they encountered no monsters, and she was beginning to get impatient, especially given that the Hero kept stopping to pick up clumps of herbs, occasionally cut down and absorb trees and branches, and once even picked up some soil. Then they encountered their first monster at a distance, the brat was the one who saw it first and she signalled a stop.

"Pyramid Tortoise?" muttered Adrian, looking utterly incredulous," what the fuck? How can something like that even exist? How is that a tortoise? It's an artillery platform!"

Malty didn't understand what he was saying. What was the problem with the monster? She looked at it and noted that while it was a little odd, it was simply a tortoise which had a pyramid for a shell, this pyramid was currently half open and she could see that it had some spikes on top of it, fairly large ones at that, that it had launched at a tree with a loud cracking sound, once the tree fell over the tortoise slowly began to eat the leaves. It had yet to notice them since it was looking in the opposite direction.

It was nothing important or special, one hellfire spell from her would kill it in an instant.

"Sir Adrian, I shall use my Hellfire spell to take it down, please give me a moment," she said, voicing out her thoughts, this brute only valued combat ability, and this was a good chance to show it.

"Unwise," said the brat, "chance of something catching fire shall be very high. Also, the tortoise has high magic defence and affinity for earth magic, it shall resist fire very well. Recommend close combat and striking the head to kill. Or using Light magic to kill from range."

Malty opened her mouth to tell the brat what she thought of her advice, but the Hero interrupted, "I want to try out a few skills on an opponent that has some defence until now practically everything I've hunted has died in a hit. Please do not interfere unless I am close to getting badly injured. Andrea buff me up please."

"Understood. I am the source of all power. Obey my orders. Giant Strength. Fortress Wall."

"Thanks," he said, smiling at the girl. And then said," Dash."

From one moment to the next he had vanished from her sight, she turned quickly trying to follow and found a blur moving from his location towards the tortoise, she couldn't make out any features but she could see the glow of the gem in the Legendary Sword, it looked like a blue streak was going through the forest.

He didn't stop but she could see from the way the streak had moved that he had managed to strike the shell of the tortoise, a moment later, the top of the Tortoise had been cut into two pieces, the upper portion sliding of the top. The Hero seemed to come into existence right to the side of the tortoise but nearly five meters away from it, he seemed to focus for a second and then swung his sword twice at a speed she couldn't follow, a white light emerged from each swing in the shape of the arc the glowing tip of the sword had followed and slammed into the tortoise.

It was shredded utterly and clearly dead.

Adrian looked annoyed. Malty felt exasperated, he couldn't even enjoy victory properly, but she did note that she got a fair amount of exp, perhaps she would level even more than she did yesterday now that the Hero was no longer a level one weakling.

Malty lead the others towards him while the hero changed his sword to another form and began to cut the beast into pieces, it took the fool nearly a minute to cut the beast into shreds and then absorb it, another thing he did that was odd, if he was going to absorb it anyway, why not absorb the whole thing at once rather wasting time by butchering it? No doubt it was some idea from the heroes world where doing something like this was needed.

Adrian got up, changed his sword form to the vicious weapon from before, and said," I think we'll need to target at least another three of these things, preferably five to be certain." then he frowned, "Andrea do you know of any monsters that have more defence than this one?"

The brat said nothing for nearly a minute, then said, " Yes. It is a rare monster called Crystal Demon that lives deep in the mountain there" she said pointing to the mountain that was at the distant edge of the forest. "You're attack is too high, nothing else will survive a hit from the attack you used. Normally the Pyramid turtles are killed with their shells being completely untouched, you cut through it with both your attacks."

She looked at him dead in the eye," Your attack stat is on par with most level 30's who specialize in attack especially when I boost your strength."

"It is to be expected from a Legendary Hero," said Bellamy, with a puffed-up chest, as if the fool had anything to do with it.

Adrian looked a little concerned for some reason but shrugged, "I see, in that case, please leave it to me to make the first attack, for now, I have a few more things to test out. Let's continue."

He started moving soon after that, and their hunt continued. The monsters gave them no trouble, and Adrain killed almost everything that they encountered in one shot. Only rarely did the rest of them have to participate and that was when they were small swarms of enemies, frankly Malty hated the pests in this forest.

"Interesting," he said, as the Hero observed the massive bear creature eating something that it had butchered, the smell of blood had spread throughout the region but the monster still turned to look at them despite neither of them making a sound, Malty could see the blood dripping from its mouth. She felt a surge of disgust at the monster, she wanted to blast it with her fire, kill this filthy thing dared to stare at her as if she were just another meal to be eaten!

"Metal hide bear." the hero continued," may I presume that it has a high defence?"

The girl spoke quickly," No."

Adrian's disappointed expression made her want to laugh, it seemed that the brat was funny sometimes, at least she was comic relief. But the man did nothing else, and a dozen swords began to emerge from his blade, each of them looking just a little different, they flew forward towards the bear, two of them missing, but most of them slamming head-on into it. They dug in deep, but despite having its skull nearly cut in half and 5 swords sticking out of this back, and another three in its limbs it still roared and tried to get up.

"Wind Slash," the hero said, and a nearly invisible blade of wind went towards the beast, which couldn't move, it cut plain through the bear, nearly slicing it in half. He sighed after it cut through it, and the bear stopped moving "I suppose that it is conclusive, my attack is sufficient for this place. But does something like Metal hide bear truly not have high defence Andrea?"

Andrea spoke," High for level 15 adventurers, but not high for you."

He nodded at that," I need to understand just what is it a normal adventurer can do. The locations that the guild maps out are according to what the average person can deal with right? I'll need to understand what a level 10 is compared to a 15." at the end of his sentence he began to walk towards the bear, his sword changing to the now-familiar form that he used to butcher the monsters, it was a vicious but short blade that seemed to cut through flesh like it was paper," Malty, Andrea, please note that there are some interesting herbs, there and there," he said pointing to the locations, "please pick them up. Thanks."

Malty kept her annoyance down and smiled at him, continuing to visualize the crown in her mind, this was a necessary sacrifice, soon she would make him understand his place.

*****************************************************************************

They spent the whole day roaming the forest, killing, butchering and absorbing everything in their path, by the end of the day when they finally broke for dinner after only having snacks and short breaks for the rest of the day, they were all filthy, covered in blood and smelled of the same. Malty had blood cleaning armour but the other three didn't so they were all quite filthy. To her surprise, however, once they got cleaned off at a nearby river, the Hero just pulled out some clothing for them to wear from his sword.

Malty was still furious, but her exhaustion was dulling everything, so when the Hero said," Malty please get the firewood with Bellamy,"

She looked at him and shouted, " He can get it on his own, I am not taking another step." for a moment after that she was surprised when all she got was an amused look, "I see that you are not used to activity for this long. I suppose it is irrelevant, Bellamy please get the firewood with Andera."

The other two nodded obediently and left, and she was alone with him for the first time in two days. She could feel her blood boiling, had this fool been testing her, how far she would go? Did he dare?

"Sorry princess, I have been quite excited about this whole trip, didn't realize how tired you had gotten." the man then continued to pull things out of his sword and started getting ready to make dinner.

Malty wanted to tear this man apart, did he think his paltry apology was enough?! She was no fool, he had to be testing her!

"It doesn't sound like you mean it Sir Hero," she said, her tone cold, she would have him running to her.

"I do mean it, you can sit out tomorrow's hunt if you like." he said, "this spot seems safe enough or you could come with us and choose to do nothing."

"I believe that today deserves more than that. Good sir," said Malty, keeping her tone a little more relaxed than before.

"That is unfortunate Princess," he said a little colder now," I was under the impression that you wished to participate in the waves, I can only imagine just how much effort we will need for them, this is just training for them."

"We have you for the waves Sir Hero," she said, feeling her anger rise, this man was supposed to beg her to forgive him, how dare he not even apologize for the day.

"I am the Sword Hero, I do not doubt my ability to kill my enemies, not after today. I must still train of course but that is a given." he said, then sighed, "I apologize princess, but I fear for your safety, these waves are said to be apocalyptic how can four men no matter how strong protect everyone?"

This pathetic fool was truly worthless, what was the point of a sword that could not even have the courage to fight. But this was still useful.

Malty smiled at him, and graciously said, "It is fine Sir Hero, you must be quite tired as well, please don't worry about any of this, I am certain that you shall be more than capable of doing your duty. And I will be here to help you throughout your trials."

"Thank you, princess," he said, a tired smile of his own.

The fool. A few simple words and he was begging for her forgiveness. He would be hers in no time.

*********************************************************************  
Her thoughts were far worse on the third day. The Sword Hero kept up his intense schedule, they had all levelled up but it was not worth the layers of filth and the persistent smell of blood that were now bound to her. Even worse was how her levels were now slightly lower than his, she looked towards her Status and found in her party inventory

_**Malty Melromarc Level 28  
Adrian Black Level 30  
Andrea Level 33  
Bellamy 32  
**_

Worse was how he kept disregarding her advice, when she had attempted to get him to stop his run through the forest, he had simply stated that if she was too tired then perhaps she should take a break, Bellamy had been left to guard her while she rested, and then he had left with the other girl.

In less than half an hour after that, he had simply commanded them to start up again, his only favour towards her? A small stamina potion. It was infuriating. Malty continued to trek behind them, they were finally moving towards the exit to the forest, but at this point, Malty had made up her mind. The Sword Hero and his two servants would pay for this indignity, she could feel her anger wish to spark up in the form of fire, and as she stared at his back the temptation to just blast him was almost impossible to stop.

Then the most disgusting bug flew out of the forest making a direct beeline for the blonde girl, Malty just sneered at the useless bug, expecting it to die but the girl just froze, unlike every other time she didn't casually deflect it with her shield and leave it open to an attack by the Hero or Bellamy instead the massive insect almost struck her with its stinger, in fact, it would have managed to had a sword not launched itself through the insect, which was killed instantly and pinned to a nearby tree.

Then more began to fly towards them, but they were still as slow as before, so Malty began to chant while the Hero and fanatic kept them busy with their sword and light magic, none of the disgusting insects got through to her, but she could see that the Hero was being forced to use more effort than normal as the girl was still just shaking in place, pathetic, this girl was supposed to be an adventurer, it seemed that she was just a fool with a powerful father after all. It must have just been the Guildmasters influence and not her own talents.

"Sir Hero, I am ready," she said, once she had finished her chant, the Sword hero didn't respond but he cut down another monster, then ran towards the brat, picked her up and retreated in the space of a second, Bellamy who had been further away, bombarding them with his light blasts simply continued.

"Hellfire," she proclaimed, and a massive firestorm emerged in front of her, it's intensity surprising even her, it would seem that her levelling up had made her even more powerful!

The insects were roasted in mere seconds, and once her fire died down to embers she could only see a few dozen of them. The Hero finished them off quickly with his floating swords and a single swipe of his that sent an arc of energy cutting down three at once.

Malty turned to see that the Hero had a concerned look on his face, as the girl got up carefully from where he had laid her down in order to finish off the monsters. Malty felt like killing the girl, her job was to act on the frontline as a defence, what good was she if she froze when she saw a monster. She would make sure that the Sword Hero kicked this useless girl out, then not only could she get someone more useful, perhaps a knight loyal to her, but she would also no longer have to deal with this annoying brat. Plus there would be no more annoying conversations between the coward and the Sword Hero.

"Bellamy." the sword hero said, "keep watch. Ensure that we are safe."

The man nodded immediately, "Yes my lord. I am using my light magic to stay aware of all that is occurring in nearly 300 meters. We shall have no trouble detecting the incoming enemies."

The Hero frowned at this," Any limitations of the spell?"

"Yes sir, the magic consumption is high and thus I cannot use this for more than fifteen minutes. Also, sir, some magics can counter this power, mostly darkness based or light-based ones."

"I see, then please don't worry and use your magic water freely, I have several stored in the sword for emergencies."

"Yes, sir!"

"Andrea," he said, his voice far too gentle with the fool who had disrupted their fight," how are you feeling right now?"

Malty sneered at his behaviour, was this fool so ridiculous as to show this girl some pity for making such a mistake, he needed to learn how to discipline his followers, clearly, he was not fit to be a leader.

The girl just stared blankly at him, she had turned to look at him when he spoke but said nothing. The Sword hero knelt and offered her healing water, slowly pushing it into her hand. That startled her into action, and then she realized what had happened, and stared at the hero who just said," Drink it please."

Andrea obeyed, and then as her wounds healed, her expression began to close off. Malty felt like slapping the idiot. The Hero noticed as well, because he continued, "Andrea, tell me did something happen to you in the first wave?"

The girl's eyes widened, and she said," How did you.."

"The name of the monster was Extra-dimensional drone insect: class alpha," he said.

Malty had to admit to some surprise here, this brat had fought against the first wave? She had known that this girl was the child of the head of the guild but frankly she had not thought much of the girl, but if this was all that this weakling was capable of then no doubt she had run away from the monsters and gotten lucky enough to be faster than them.

When the girl said nothing for about 30 seconds, Adrian stood back up, "Anything to note Bellamy?"

"No sir, we are clear."

"Very well. Everyone we are taking a break, let's return to the same spot where we took our third break in yesterday, I believe it is close enough and is likely to be easy to secure." he said and then turned to where the girl was still sitting down, "Andrea, please stand up, we can deal with this after we've had a snack and some rest."

The girl stared at his offered hand for a second before standing up without taking it," It is fine. I can continue." she said, trying to sound stoic, but Malty could easily hear the waver that the pathetic girl had in her voice. Still, it was good that she wasn't willing to waster Malty's time.

"No, not right now." he said simply, but firmly " we shall eat, rest and then speak. We can continue after that."

Malty felt furious for a moment as she realized that he had let her rest so easily while he hadn't even considered letting her rest for a moment! But then Malty felt a small smile emerge as she realized that Adrian was going to show this girl her place, it would seem that he had realized how useless she was and was trying to let her down easy while removing her from his party by letting her relax first. He was a kind fool but she could see how to use that so it was not a problem. Malty almost laughed as she realized that the girl who she had been planning to kick out soon had already blundered so badly.

Sometimes things were too easy.

**************************************************************************************  
Bellamy POV:

They all sat down in their old resting site, it was a good location, a large clearing so that nothing could easily sneak up on them, some logs and stones for decent seating, and since they had collected a number of branches yesterday to feed to the Legendary Sword, Sir Adrian simply used them as firewood and then changed his Sword into a candle-like form and started the fire.

"Sword Hero this is not needed." said Miss Andrea, sounding tired, rather than annoyed," we should continue hunting."

"Let us eat first. A small delay is insignificant." he replied, his voice as calm as ever," and we have levelled up far beyond my expectations. Even if we should leave right now it would not be a big loss, but I think that there is something we should do here."

Bellamy wasn't sure what the Hero was referring to at the end of his sentence but he did agree that they had levelled up far beyond any reasonable expectations. But then while the Saint did not see just how incredible he was, Bellamy could see just why they had made such progress through the Dark Forest.

Truth be told, Bellamy had been here before with his comrades from the Church. They had camped out here for two weeks to level up, and despite their best efforts they had spent most of the time running from too tough monsters, carefully analyzing a foe to ensure they could take it down, and then using combination attacks to defeat them. It had been exhausting work but rewarding as well. Bellamy had grown two levels going from level 18 to 20 and he had been proud of his work and that of his fellows.

He had not realized just how inadequate their methods had been until today.

The Sword Hero was unstoppable, every monster he faced died quickly in a single series of hits, not a one was allowed to escape, and they maintained a constant yet calm pace through the forest, ensuring that none of them tired out. Regular breaks, magic and stamina boosting waters made by the Holy Sword and the fact that it was the Sword Hero who did most of the work had all but ensured their smooth flow. Then Bellamy had realized that the Sword Hero was growing as the day passed on, monsters that were fast enough to dodge a strike or two from the Hero fell instantly unable to match his pace, monsters large enough to take two strikes to fully kill or cripple were torn apart in a single strike, skills from the Hero were used more frequently and most of all his sense of battle grew.

It was inspiring to see visible improvement as the Hero fought, Bellamy had not participated in a wave but he had seen some of the refugees, he had felt grief when he had realized that for all his skill with Light magic and healing he could do nothing to help them, for the very reason those refugees had come to the capital was because they had nothing left of their homes. But now Bellamy was certain, the three Heroes would defeat the waves. There would be no more orphaned children created due to those horrific dimensional rifts.

"It's done." the Hero said, his words breaking Bellamy out of his thoughts,the Hero then got up and handed a small plate with some roasted meat and herbs to each of them, he had even given them a small pair of forks and knives with which to tear at the meat," Let's eat."

The smell of the simple fare in front of him was a surprise. The Hero had done nothing but roast some meat with a few spices he had picked up from here and there, but the aroma was beyond anything he had ever eaten. Bellamy knew that he was used to simple foods, as a member of the Church he was bound to eat simple food whenever possible and growing up as he had, high-quality food was never present, indeed food itself was far from guaranteed, and here he was, blessed enough to be served food by a Saint.

Bellamy quickly sent a prayer to his God, grateful that he had seen fit to serve him food made by God's avatar. Truly he had been blessed.

The aroma quickly grew to be too tempting and once he was done with his prayer he took a bite, the flavour exploded in his mouth and he was unable to stop the hum of appreciation. Truly the food blessed by a Saint was the best! The Princess Malty did not seem to appreciate the meal, as expected of a sinner like her, her false smile obvious to Bellamy. But young Miss Andrea took a hesitant bite and then quickly began to finish the rest.

The Hero had started eating but Bellamy found him carefully looking at Andrea, whose full attention was on the food, the expression on his face was grave.

For a moment Bellamy wondered why, and then he felt ashamed that he had not realized it immediately. The Hero was attempting to judge how he could help the young lady who had no doubt been traumatized by the first wave.

Bellamy had read the reports, the first wave had not truly been stopped for several hours, thousands had died in the initial hour or two after the Wave had started despite the best efforts of all the people there, but what had been worse in Bellamy's eyes was just how the devastation had continued for days afterwards, even after the anchor to the portal, the greatest monster of the wave had been defeated, the massive number of monsters unleashed prior to the closing of the rift had spread out throughout the region, entire fields of crops, small villages and various travellers had paid the price, even now most of those monsters were still alive, with only those closest to large population centres having been dealt with.

Despite this he had not expected to meet a monster from a wave, truthfully the insects earlier had been weak. But in swarms he could imagine the danger they posed even to experienced adventurers, let alone to the common folk who would likely be their preferred prey. He did not know what Miss Andrea had been doing there but if she had been there then there was no doubt that she must have lost someone, and it seems that seeing those insects again had sent her off into flashbacks, causing her to freeze.

In that state, had the Hero not saved her, she would have died without a doubt. But Bellamy still felt that it was unacceptable that she needed to be saved, it was one thing to be traumatized it was another to make things difficult for the Hero. After all, they were his companions, if they could not prove to be his support what right did they have to stand by his side and benefit from his blessings?

It was the same reason that he despised the Princess. The arrogant sinner who had killed innocent men by accusing them of raping her or simply mistreating her, was no doubt attempting to use the Hero just as she had chosen to use them. After their first day of adventuring when he had returned to the church dormitories to rest, Father Andrew had called him to his office and explained the true nature of the princess to him, and warned him that she would attempt to influence the Hero and control him and possibly even try to have the Hero remove Bellamy and any other party members who were not under her control.

It shamed him now that he had been worried about the Saint, throughout these three days he had witnessed countless attempts of the princess to influence him, and the Saint had wisely managed to navigate every one of her traps!

"Now Andrea can we speak of what happened there?' the Hero said," And make no mistake, this is a request. If you do not wish to speak, tell me that and I shall not bring it up again."

Miss Andrea said nothing for a long moment.

Then," Are you going to remove me from the party?"

"If you are willing to work to improve your reaction to those monsters, then no." he said, "but Andrea, we will face a great many enemies, it is one thing to face that small swarm, it will be another thing entirely if you freeze during the waves when countless enemies seek to kill us all."

"It will not happen again," she said, gritting her teeth."I will not be weak again. The next time I'll kill them all."

"There will be a next time Andrea, and in all likelihood a time after that, I can see that you wish to avenge something that the waves took from you." said the Sword Hero,"But if your reaction is to freeze up or to go into a frenzy then I'm afraid that you will only be a liability."

"If you want me to leave, then tell me to leave." she said, glaring at him, her tone shifting from sullen anger to sudden fury, "don't play around with me!"

It was the very first time that he had seen such emotion from the young woman. He could see her face twist and her subconsciously reach for her sword.

"Don't speak to Sir Adrian like that," said the Princess, her voice full of venom," he has shown nothing but kindness to you and you are spitting on it!"

"Enough" came in a flat tone from the Sword Hero, and both girls turned towards him, about to say something.

"Malty please do not interfere in this matter. This is between Andrea and I and no one else," he said and then glared at both the Princess and then Bellamy, Bellamy quickly nodded.

"But Adrian she is insulting you, don't waste your time on-"

"Enough princess." he said, the princess looked stunned, he turned towards the other girl "Andrea, I have no intention of removing you from the party for a single event. My concern is the possibility of this happening again and nothing more. If you wish to leave, then you are always free to do so, but I will not ask you to leave because something reminded you of what is likely one of the worst days of your life."

"The worst," muttered Ms Andrea, but the Sword Hero nodded.

"The worst then," he said, Andrea looked a little surprised that he heard that, "but it is something that has to be addressed, and so I ask if you wish to face those things again today or at a later date?"

Andrea looked stunned," Wh..what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that this is something that we need to overcome if you are to fight in the waves to come. So either we can fight them today and hope that we can improve or if you do not think it wise we shall leave and train elsewhere and one day before the Waves start again, we go to the location of the first wave and fight the remnants that are clearly present," he stated.

"Frankly this method is crude, and any psychologist would probably be furious with me but I believe that we need to do something or the first wave may very well lead to your death or someone else's"

When she didn't answer for a long time, he spoke again, " So what shall-"

"Let's do it." she said, her tone calm again, her face etched with determination "I will beat them this time."

The Hero smiled, "Then let's start."

************************************************************************************


	9. Chapter 9

**Adrian POV**

The darkness that surrounded them despite it being near midday made the whole place quite eerie, the occasional howls and loud screeches did not help matters, the fact that the forest swallowed up the sound of their footsteps made it even worse.

Adrian loved it. He had always liked being in the wilds, but normally the preparations and caution he had been forced to take had prevented him from fully enjoying himself, but here with his enhanced physical and sensory capabilities thanks to the Sword and the levels he had gained, he could see in the dark effortlessly and easily navigate the relatively difficult terrain. It was amazing and was probably the first unequivocally positive thing that had occurred since he had arrived in this world.

Not even the monsters could disrupt his joy, mainly because they were weak enough that using a skill or two was more than enough to defeat them, but also because they were the source of power that let him enjoy his environment. Truthfully Adrian still found it very, very odd that killing a monster and absorbing it somehow allowed him to enhance himself, but it worked and worked spectacularly at that and as it was his only means of survival in this world he would have to embrace it whole-heartedly. No matter his doubts or concerns.

Adrian currently had a small handful of skills active. _Blade Projection_ for attack and defence and _Blindsight_ for a sensory boost. Both powers were ones that he had gained during his first day in the fields and were incredibly useful ones.

_Blade Projection_ was the ability to create copies of his swords that he had mastered and control them telekinetically, it had limits in that the copies were fragile, cost a fair bit of SP, and didn't have any of the special abilities of the original sword. But it was useful in that it had the attack rating of the original and he could control up to four of them effortlessly as if they were his limbs. This power was the main one he had been using to defeat his enemies for the past three days, it let him attack from range with finesse to test out an opponent and the cost wasn't so high as to be prohibitive.

_Blindsight_, on the other hand, was without question the most useful power he had obtained, it allowed him the ability to perceive everything made out of matter or magic in a large radius around him and process the information flawlessly. He could expand and reduce the range and even get some fine details about the target, he had other extrasensory powers, one that boosted his sense of smell, another that let him see in the ultraviolet range and even a mana sight power, but they all had significant drawbacks, _Blindsight _had no such thing, save for the SP consumption.

With these two powers, he had dominated everything in the forest. _Blindsight _let him navigate towards enemies with no effort and hundred per cent accuracy and _Blade Projection_ let him test their defences from safety, and in most cases kill them. Even as they tracked his current prey, he was occasionally killing a monster or two that he wished to absorb. It was a little difficult to describe just how easy it was, but Adrian was beginning to understand why the original Sword, Spear and Bow Heroes had been convinced that this was all a game, it was becoming increasingly effortless for him to fight his enemies, for those three who had intelligence on their enemies and the world, it must truly have felt game-like. Real-life was never easy after all and certainly did not have Exp, levels or magic.

Adrian's party had been mostly useless, to be certain Adrian had taken some risks he would not normally have taken without their presence but in the end, nothing would have changed beyond the level of caution and the number of SP potions he would have consumed. It was the first time that he had realized just how weak his party members were, no doubt he had been impressed by them initially because he was using his world as a standard. Naturally, someone pathetic in a world where it is possible to enhance themselves by merely killing monsters would be far more powerful than even the best in a world where such a mechanic didn't exist. Adrian was starting to rethink his initial idea of them being assassins, they were probably just people who were here to use him to get stronger or gain influence, or feed information about him to the various factions of Melromarc.

Currently, he was using a combination of his _Blindsight _and _Mana Sense_ to keep track of an Insect Drone, the same type of monster that had sent Andrea into flashbacks before.

Adrian and his party had found a small force of about fifteen insects and had crushed most of them, leaving a few to retreat. They had then had followed them. His goal? To test Andrea, possibly help her should she prove trustworthy and useful and if not then to potentially find an excuse to remove her from the party at his convenience.

It was quite cruel to throw a teenager face-first into her recent trauma, and there was a part of him that felt immensely guilty about it. He had seen traumatized people never recover from the horrors they faced and here he was potentially making it worse. Plus the trauma had been during the First Wave, so it had been about fifteen days or so since then, a very recent event, which was probably even worse.

He was definitely going to hell for this, but he had few other options, he couldn't trust her or her backers, and he was not willing to condemn himself for a girl that was almost certainly spying on him or using him for some purpose or the other and getting her emotional could be very helpful in uncovering one of the reasons for her to join him.

She had made him very suspicious when she had mentioned that she wanted to join the party with the least number of people, the most obvious interpretation was that she wanted to level up faster, but as far as he could tell she had not known about the Exp boost, so he wasn't certain about the precise reasoning she followed. This trauma she had could be the first chink in her armour for Adrian to exploit until he either knew enough to trust her or remove her from the picture.

Adrian signalled for caution when he observed the target finally stop near a massive honeycomb-like structure that was embedded into a tree, nearly five meters off the forest floor. It was truly massive and looked like it was infesting the whole tree, he could see nearly 300 insects of various types and more than a thousand eggs and a huge insect with a swollen abdomen that was currently in the process of making another ten or so eggs. It was quite a disgusting sight even though the lens of his Blindsight.

Their number was a bit of a surprise but not too much of one. It would simply take him more SP to kill them in comparison to most of the monsters in the forest.

He stopped and turned towards his party members after they got into visual range of the hive, Bellamy and Malty looked quite normal, with the fanatic turning his full attention to Adrian and Malty giving him a smile which was offset by her clear fatigue, but Andrea was tense, she was shaking a little and gripping her sword tightly enough that he could see that her knuckles had gone white.

His guilt made a resurgence here, and for a moment he was tempted to just call this off, but he killed that feeling, now was not the time for sentiment. He would try to help her after this if she proved somewhat trustworthy but he could allow pity to shape his actions.

" I have noted a fairly large hive of the insects about five hundred or so meters from here." he said, "I think you can all see it well enough. It seems to have an estimated 300 or so drones and a significantly larger insect that I suspect is the Queen of the hive that is laying eggs. The Queen doesn't seem to have any combat capabilities but to avoid any surprises that thing is going to be my first target." he stopped her for a moment but when he received no reaction beyond Andrea getting even tenser, he went on.

"Malty, your role here is critical. I need you to use your strongest fire spell on the hive first to thin their numbers as much as possible. Your spell will likely determine if we shall succeed or fail here, I shall have a skill prepared to support you if need be, but the main role is yours."

She smiled widely at that," I shall not fail you Sir Adrian, rest assured my _Hellfire Storm_ shall be more than enough for these pests."

Adrian immediately noted to have his_Sword Beams_ ready in case she was making an empty boast, but just said," I shall look forward to it then." with a small smile, before turning to Bellamy.

"Your duty shall be primarily to protect myself and Andrea who shall be on the front line and ensure that if a second casting is needed from Malty, she has the time to do so."

"Yes, Sir!" he exclaimed," It shall be done." Adrian nodded in response, feeling a little exhausted and wondering just how the man had this much energy after nearly three days of hunting with limited rest.

"Andrea, frontline as usual. I shall back up you up as much as possible but this is your fight first."

Andrea nodded stiffly, a determined expression appearing on her face, as she relaxed just a little. Adrian was a little shocked by her sudden change and couldn't help but feel a burst of admiration for this girl, she was truly facing up to her trauma, he didn't know for certain if this head-on charge was wise but her bravery was making him feel like scum. He crushed the feeling swiftly.

"Excellent. Let's begin," he said with a smile and shifted his sword from the one he was working on mastering to a more useful form for this assault.

**Pyramid Tortoise Sword (Mastered)(7/40): Lv 7 5.83%**

**Energy Level 7/100**

**Rarity: Uncommon**

**Enchantments: Flying enemies +65% Damage**

**Status Enchantments : -30% SP Cost**

**Status Rating**

**Attack: 75**

**Magic Attack:121**

**Defence: 30**

**Magic Defence: 60**

**Speed: 20**

**SP : +32**

**MP: +67**

**Stamina: 40**

**Damage Increase: +65% to Flying Type Enemies**

**Equip Boosts : Attack +7; Defense +3; Magic Power +10**

**Equip Skills: Sword Beam (medium); Sword Beam Barrage;**

**Special Ability: SP Drain(medium)**

The sword was an odd-looking one, it was like the shell of the Pyramid Tortoise had been twisted into a helical structure, flattened and then attached to a hilt that looked like the head of the tortoise but the weird looks did not detract from the fact that it was easily one of the best swords he could use and the _SP drain_ power combined with the SP preservation status effect made it perfect for using the_Sword Beam_ skill.

Adrian prepared himself. He had his _Blade Projections_ floating and ready, his Sword was in the correct form, he had the Magic Water and SP potions ready for himself and his party and the enemy was unaware of the imminent attack as verified by his _Blindsight_. Adrian walked forward keeping a swift and steady pace, using his _Blindsight _to make sure nothing else was in the area and that the insects were still unaware.

Once they reached within the range of Malty's spell and had a clear shot at the hive, she tugged on his arm, and he and Andrea moved forward weapons at the ready while Malty and Bellamy prepared their spells and began to chant.

Then the insects were suddenly moving, he didn't know exactly why they were suddenly agitated; perhaps they had some detection ability, but Adrian didn't hesitate, he took aim and fired a massive blast.

His _Sword Beam_ was an interestingly variable ability. Adrian could choose the diameter of the blast, if he had _Blade Projections_ active then he could use them to fire a barrage of beams, and he could even control how long he kept the beam active for and he could move the sword to target a wide area effortlessly given that the beam seemed to have no inertia of its own. All of this resulted in what was easily his best AOE attack, the only drawback? A massive SP cost, which was precisely why he needed to use the Pyramid Tortoise Sword despite its mediocre attack rating, the _SP drain _skill was simply too useful in combination with the Beam.

Without his SP mitigation Status Enchant and the _SP drain_, a single 5-second blast consumed about 60% of his SP. With both of these, he could reduce it to about 30 % if he was lucky. The difference was truly substantial but hopefully after a few levels and the right equip bonuses he would no longer need to be concerned with the SP loss.

The SP he lost was well worth it, the massive hive and the Queen were both struck hard by the beam, and he could see a massive swell in his Exp points along with the wonderful sight of the hive and the tree it was collapsing on itself. The loud sound was rather jarring but Adrian ignored it as he moved the beam slightly, just by a few degrees, and the exp continued coming in, it was truly convenient to have an auto-kill confirmation ability in this world.

He stopped the blast after five seconds, feeling an odd sort of tiredness that was not quite the same as normal fatigue, a familiar feeling after a few days of combat that signalled a large, swift loss of SP. The damage was done. The Queen was dead, and the remnants were in chaos.

But the insects did not stop there, most of the swarm was dead or crippled as they had yet to leave the hive before he had fired on them. However, nearly a third of them still lived. Adrian used his _Blindsight _to focus on Malty and Bellamy and noted that they were not yet ready. He considered the enemy numbers for a moment and the fact that dozens of the fastest ones were already coming closer to them and then used his _Sword Beam_ again.

This time he used a beam with a larger diameter and lesser SP, it would do less damage per unit area, but he was not targeting a hive or a tree anymore but insects out in the open air with nothing to stop the blast, thus as he swept the beam through the closest insects they died without any difficulty and the enemy number was slashed in half again.

Exp notifications filled his status screen once more. Adrian winced slightly as he noted that his SP was at about fifty per cent, the lowest he had ever allowed it to fall, but choose to ignore it for the moment. He still had enough to use his more efficient moves dozens of times and even a full-powered _Sword Beam_ once more. It should be enough.

Malty finally finished her chant here, and a massive burst of fire that surprised everyone in his party, even Malty, erupted at the location of the embedded remnants of the hive. The fire blast was large enough and hot enough that Adrian could feel the heat from nearly a hundred meters away, it was quite impressive, but he doubted the insects shared his opinion, as most of their crippled brethren who had been injured when he had launched his first strike ended up getting roasted.

The exp was enough to get him to level up again but he ignored the notifications and instead focused on his _Blade Projections _and got ready to _Dash _into battle.

Adrian felt the world around him slow down as his SP began to vanish. He triggered his _Dash _skill and felt himself move through a corridor of altered space. It was a difficult phenomenon to describe but it was the same feeling he got when his perception and speed stats went up, amplified nearly a hundredfold. But the result was simple, he had suddenly moved from nearly a hundred meters away to 80 meters, then 60 and then 40 and then he was close enough for him to use the projections.

Adrian shredded his foes effortlessly. His telekinetically controlled swords meant that he didn't even have to move from his new location and _Dash _had allowed him to close the distance before the monsters had time to react, some of the insects that were closer to him originally had gotten through to his party, but that had been deliberate as he wanted to see how Andrea reacted to them. After all, the whole point of this exercise was to see how she dealt with them, if his goal was to simply kill them all, a third _Sword Beam_ would have been a better solution.

His _Blindsight _allowed him to see Andrea pale rapidly, but then she moved forward, her expression shifting into a combination of fury and determination. Unfortunately, her fight lacked the skill and control that he was used to seeing from her. She managed to kill the first three but then charged towards the ones that were arriving. Andrea killed them easily enough but it moved her out of position, and Bellamy had to participate for the first time in this battle, using his prepared _Light Lances_ to kill the insects that got past Andrea.

Andrea didn't even notice. Instead, she killed the insects near her, her rage blinding her to the ones that were about the flank her.

Adrian took care of these, he aimed and activated _Dash_, not to speed towards her but to get the perception enhancement, and then triggered a _Sword Beam_ that lasted for less than a tenth of a second and was barely a few centimetres in diameter. It missed his target initially but a small sweep killed the insect that had been about to strike her.

Andrea didn't notice the insect nor his interference.

Adrian made eye-contact with Bellamy, who tersely nodded when Adrian indicated Andrea. Leaving her protection to Bellamy, Adrian instead focused on the remnants of the hive. By the time he was done slaughtering them, he found that the battle was over and the whole area of the forest was full of insect corpses with the distinct and horrible smell of burned bugs.

Adrian flared his _Blindsight _again, and after a moment of verifying that there were no nearby enemies, he focused on Andrea. He could see that her battle frenzy had passed and that she was feeling wretched, he felt a little bad as he considered that he may have very well traumatized the teenager in a _different _way. What an amazing achievement.

He walked up to her, noting that Bellamy had done his job quite well, she didn't have a single wound on her, then he used his sword and drew out a Stamina potion from its storage. She didn't turn to him when he offered her the potion, nor did she react in any way for a long moment before saying, "I failed."

"I dare say you did far better than the first time you faced them." he said, after considering Andrea for a moment," Immediate and complete improvement was not the goal remember? It was to see how you performed against the insects with some warning and preparation, and you did well."

"I lost control," she said, more strength in her voice this time, but more self-loathing as well," You were right Hero, I am a liability. What is the point of a defender that cannot defend well enough to protect anyone?!" by the end of her sentence she was shouting.

For a moment he wondered what the hell she was talking about, she had certainly not needed to protect anyone here. Then he slowly began to piece the puzzle together. Andrea had been more than strong enough to crush the bugs the very first time they had met, in fact, he would go as far as to say that with her skill and defences she could probably kill twenty to thirty of them with no backup at all, but if she had failed to save someone else during the wave then her behaviour made perfect sense.

"You did lose control." he admitted, trying to keep his voice as calm and matter-of-fact as possible."But that is not some sort of irredeemable sin. You improved compared to before, and in the future, you shall continue to improve as long as you are willing to be as brave as you were today."

"I will not pretend to know what you lost," he continued, torn between the two impulses to help this girl or to test her," but I have seen people recover from their losses, it is never easy, and in a way, you will never be the same as you were. Time, effort and support from others can help but the void is never filled but you learn how to recover with experience."

It was a bitter lesson that he had shoved down his throat by his mother and Edward. His best friend had been the one who had pulled him out of his depression after his father's death, Adrian had no doubt he would have been far worse off without the man's intervention. Adrian felt ashamed of using his friend's words for himself to manipulate this girl, and worse he felt ashamed for realising that he felt only shame because he was wielding his friend's words not because he was trying to shape this traumatized teen to his will.

For a moment after he spoke, he wondered if she would scream at him, but it seemed that something he had said reached her. For she just looked at him carefully, looking just a shade more relaxed than she had been a moment ago.

"Who?" she asked, and he didn't need any elaboration. He still hesitated to answer but gave it up in the end. It was a trivial fact in the grand scheme of things.

"My father," he said, trying to keep his voice level, and failing.

She nodded, and for a moment said nothing, then," I was near the Seaetto Region when the wave started. My team and I had just escorted a Merchant there." she took a deep breath and then continued," the wave just started...there was no warning. My team fought to protect the villagers, and I helped them get to a shelter while my team held the monsters off. It didn't work. The shelters were overrun before we got there and by the time I returned to my team after finding a safe place for the villagers, they were already dead." she looked at one of the dead bugs tiredly," these things were eating them."

Adrian found that all thought of manipulating the girl had faded from his mind by the time she had finished her sentence, instead, he felt his guilt multiply as her statement of the Seatto Region struck his mind. There had been another girl who was traumatized by the wave and had lived in the same place, a girl who was currently a slave, either in a cage waiting to die or being tortured by a nobleman. A girl whom he had disregarded utterly.

"I don't know if I'll be able to fight well enough Sir Adrian," Andrea said," but I'll try if you'll have me."

She sounded resigned as if her removal from the party was obvious, and perhaps it was what he should have done but there was only one answer he could give Andrea.

"You are part of my team, Andrea," he said," that has not changed and it will not. I have no intention of removing someone willing to fight the waves despite what you have gone through."

It was only after Adrian had spoken that he realized that his final sentence to Andrea had not been a lie.

******************************************************************************


	10. Chapter 10 (Andrea I)

**_Andrea _**

Andrea felt the vibrations running through her armour slowly fade as the carriage came to a stop just inside the southern gates to the city. It was a genuine relief to know that their journey had ended, she didn't know precisely what Adrian had promised the man driving the carriage but he had done his best to get back into town as swiftly as possible. Of course, this speed was only possible due to the sacrifice of comfort.

Adrian got up first, picking up the small bag he was carrying and feeding it to the Holy Sword even as he walked out of the carriage and went to speak to the driver. Andrea was quick to follow after shaking Bellamy awake and picking up her weapons.

The day was almost over, red streaks filled the sky, she couldn't see the sun directly from her current position but it was almost sunset, so it had to be around five or six in the evening. They had made very good time.

Andrea stretched slightly feeling a sense of relief at finally reaching home. She carefully flared her empathic senses and tried to contain her wince as the now familiar feeling of _anger/hatred/determination/grief _from Adrian flooded her senses, his emotions had been getting more and more negative from the moment they had started to approach the Capital. The other two were almost emotionally dead in comparison and the driver and the surrounding people were having only mild emotions in comparison to the depth that Adrain had.

It was a reminder that despite what appearances might suggest the Sword Hero was not happy with the current situation.

Andrea turned to look at him as he spoke to the driver, as he handed over a small pouch of coins to the man, she felt the drivers joy and awe as well as Adrian's low key disdain for the awe. It had surprised her a little when she had first sensed Adrian's disdain for Bellamy's awe and respect but she suspected she understood his reaction, Adrian was okay with respect but only for something _worth _respecting, if someone respected him for merely being the Sword Hero then he found it disgusting.

She noted that Adrian and the driver were both looking at the Filolials and taking, Adrian's emotions shifted slightly and she could recognize an interesting cocktail of _curiosity/nostalgia/concern_ taking over his mind. But before she could listen in to the conversation her attention was drawn away by the increasing _irritation/anger_ sensation she was getting from the princess, Andrea turned to look at the princess looking annoyed at the Hero but when she caught Andrea looking at her, the _irritation/anger _changed to _anger/disdain/disgust_. The princess said nothing, however, and went back to looking at the hero. It would seem that she was wise enough not to anger the Hero. Perhaps she could learn.

Adrian finished the conversation soon and started to walk towards them, his attention, however, was on the feather that he was feeding to the Holy Sword. Andrea thought nothing of it, she had seen him feed the Holy Sword hundreds of times in the past few days, it was surprising how quickly it had become a mundane part of her life. Then for just a moment, she felt a massive flare of _satisfaction/determination/joy_ from the Sword Hero, Andrea instantly paid her full attention to him and found that his eyes were unfocused, probably looking at his status screen.

Interesting, something very good must have happened for his emotions to shift so drastically. But what was so good about a Filolial feather sword?

"Alright, I suppose we are done for now," he stated, his emotions now muted as he focused on the conversation, all his hatred, sorrow and anger buried deep within, "I plan to get something to eat and then go to a magic shop," he continued and then nodded at Andrea and Bellamy, "after our discussions I have a number of questions I need answers for as soon as possible. You are free to join me or relax elsewhere, it's totally up to you."

Andrea didn't need long to consider it. She was a little tired but one of the subtle benefits of the rapid levelling up was that their stamina was honestly growing just a little bit faster than they were using it, this would be a good chance to speak to Adrian alone, right now despite how much he had helped her in the forest, despite the fact that he had genuinely meant his promise about letting her stay in his party, he had a great many doubts. It was logical for him to have them it spoke well of his intelligence that he had them, but it was undeniable that his emotions were getting to be rather intense as a side effect.

The princess and Bellamy were not helping matters in any way.

Princess Malty was simply out to use him and she was being rather obvious with her seduction tactics. Perhaps it might have worked on one of the other heroes, they had all been excited rather than worried or furious, but Adrian had been worried and cautious from the start, and her blatant attempts at seduction had simply made him even more suspicious.

Bellamy, in contrast, was genuinely _loyal _to the Sword Hero and she suspected that Adrian knew that, the problem was that Adrian still didn't think of himself as the Sword Hero. He probably didn't want to think of himself as such, which would make him reluctant to accept Bellamy's loyalty. This coupled with the fact that both Bellamy and Malty had obvious backers made Adrian rather concerned with their presence.

Indeed her presence also made him very nervous, she had noted how his emotions had shifted after her answer as to why she had joined him. At that point she had not had a very good grasp on him, truthfully she had not expected much of him, he had simply seemed to be the best among a series of poor options. Andrea had mistaken his lack of knowledge for a lack of intelligence, a foolish assumption on her part that she had been forced to rapidly correct over the past few days.

"Thank you for the offer Sir Adrian but I have missed my father greatly," stated Malty, her eyes almost shining, but her mind was as twisted as ever," I shall be joining him for dinner today."

Adrian didn't bother saying a word, he simply nodded at her and then looked to Andrea and Bellamy.

"I'll join you," said Andrea.

Bellamy bowed and said," I shall be honoured to dine with you, sir."

"Good. Malty," he said turning towards the princess," please remember that we have tomorrow set aside as a day to relax. We shall meet up on the day after tomorrow, to continue our training, in front of these gates at 6 in the morning. If you wish to meet me for whatever reason tomorrow I shall be found at the Firebrand Inn."

"Of course Adrian." she stated as she walked away, giving him a wave and utterly ignoring Andrea and Bellamy," I shall be well prepared."

Andrea wanted to laugh at the _fury/embarrassment/hate_ that the princess was feeling and at the synchronized feeling of _disdain_ towards her from Bellamy and Adrian.

Adrian turned to look at both of them and smiled. For once the smile was backed with some genuine feeling," Let's get something good to eat, we have worked quite hard these past few days. Any suggestions?"

Bellamy was quick to answer but Andrea ignored the conversation that followed as they began to walk deeper into the city, her attention was instead on the feeling of relief she was sensing from Adrian. Perhaps she was wrong about his attitude and thoughts towards herself and Bellamy, it seemed that most of his concern was reserved for the princess.

Slowly a plan began to crystallize as she considered all the information she had. One that would secure her position in his party while ensuring that the Sword Hero would be free from his concerns.

**********************************************************************

It had merely been an hour since she had formed her plan and she was already starting to realize that she had been very, very arrogant to assume that she understood Adrian well enough to make a plan around him.

Andrea was reminded of something her father had said one day when she had been particularly stupid with the use of her power,_ '__emotions are not motivations, nor are they thoughts.'_

It was a sentence that had stuck with her since, a reminder that while her power granted her remarkable insight into people it was far from perfect. Right now Adrian and his horrifying emotional state were reminding her of that fact.

He had been fairly relaxed while they walked towards the inn, Adrian had been asking Bellamy some questions about the cooking of all things, and Andrea had been content to just stay quiet and bask in their calm emotions. Then Adrian had fallen silent for just a second too long after Bellamy asked him a question and she had wondered what had happened. Adrian had quickly started the conversation again but the flare of _disgust/hatred/horror_ had been unmistakable.

That had ruined dinner for her.

The food had been amazing and Adrian had kept his emotions at bay for the most part, playing the role of party leader and encouraging both of them, planning the next training trip and keeping the conversation going, trying to include both of them and even mediating between them when the Church was brought up but his emotions just kept on getting more and more distorted, and her powers did not let her ignore such a thing.

Adrian had not shown many signs of his increasing discomfort and indeed had insisted that they go on to the magic shop when Bellamy had stated that the only experts he knew were from the church, Andrea had taken the chance to tell him about Agatha's atelier. She just hoped that the old witch wasn't there right now, one of her apprentices would be best, but if what Andrea was suspecting was correct then Agatha was probably the only person in the capital who could answer the questions that Adrian had about status magic correctly.

Andrea hoped that it would place him in a better mood than he currently was in.

"Miss Andrea," said Bellamy," would this atelier be the same one that is run by the Witch of Ruin?"

Andrea was a little surprised that he had figured out where they were going since she had only mentioned that she knew an expert, though she supposed that there weren't many magic-related ateliers in the nearby area so it was easier than most cases.

"Yes," she answered," I hope to be able to speak to one of Agatha's apprentices."

Adrian interrupted here, the burst of _curiosity/concern/caution _driving his actions," That's quite a title."

Andrea understood the implicit question," She is a war hero, it is said that her powers could match or exceed even the Seven Star Heroes. Her title is due to her signature spell that could consume all life in a massive area."

Adrian had another spike of emotion here, "Seven Star Heroes?" he echoed.

Andrea blinked and then wanted to hit herself. Adrian had adapted to the world quickly enough that she often forgot that this was completely new territory for him, even the most common legends would be stories he had never heard of. Thankfully Bellamy started to speak while she was considering how to summarize everything she knew about the Heroes.

"They are powerful people who wield one of seven weapons of legend," stated Bellamy,"it is said that they are weaker versions of the Legendary Weapons and that they can be used to summon people from other worlds to act as their wielders or if that fails they can find people from our world to wield them. The Seven Star Heroes are incredibly powerful in comparison to most warriors Sir Adrian, though they are nothing compared to your power."

"That is very...interesting." he stated, his emotions moving towards an interesting combination of _intrigue/concern/anger_," Anything else about them? What are they doing about the waves?"

Andrea and Bellamy looked towards each other, and for once she felt that they were on the same wavelength. This was a complex topic that they had stumbled on, and Adrian was very concerned about the answer. Andrea took a moment to consider it and then decided to explain in full, it would likely be for the best, she was certain that Adrian would not react well to a lie, even a lie of omission.

"They are politically constrained." she stated," All the Seven Star Heroes are very important figures in their country's politics and lack the ability of the Legendary Heroes to teleport directly to the waves. Which makes deploying them a problem."

"If they are truly unusually strong, and given that you used them as a benchmark for incredible strength I can only imagine that they are a critical part of a nation's military power. Does Melromarc have a Seven Star Hero?" he asked.

"Yes sir we do," said Bellamy," you have already met him. King Aultcray is the wielder of the Legendary Cane."

At this point, they had neared the atelier so Andrea said," We are here Adrian, perhaps we should continue this later?"

For a moment his _impatience _was clear to her senses, he definitely wanted to continue the conversation, then it was rapidly eradicated as he took a deep breath and slipped into his battle mindset. He was about to say something when he took a look at the atelier and then blinked rapidly in succession while shaking his head.

A second later he closed his eyes for a second or two and opened them slowly, before saying," What exactly is this odd feeling around the atelier? It feels like its...distorted somehow."

Andrea frowned slightly before extending her mana towards the atelier, she had her suspicions about what he was feeling and her mana thread confirmed it, somehow he had sensed the protections around the atelier, perhaps it was a passive skill that he had obtained from the Holy Sword?

Bellamy didn't have to verify the situation as she did, he answered immediately while she was still contemplating Adrian's new ability," Those are magical protections, sir. I do not know much about the Witch of Ruin but even I have heard of her skill and the amazing enchantments she is capable of. It is likely that these protections are needed for her safety and to ensure that theft is prevented."

Andrea wanted to interrupt here, Agatha was many things but she was not one to bother with such paltry protections. If it were up to her she would have layered the place with any number of lethal spells rather than the alarm and barrier spells she could sense, this was probably the work of one of her apprentices, Ethan most likely, but just as she was about to say so, the door was opened and it slammed into the wall hard, the sound echoed throughout the street and some nearby birds were started enough to take flight.

Andrea took one look at the unnerving smile on Agatha's face, the feeling of _hunger/awe/desire_ and immediately realized that this had been a mistake.

"Show me that Sword of yours boy!" said the old mage. Andrea felt like slamming her head against the wall as Adrian began to shift into his battle mindset fully, the Sword that he had hidden away by transforming into a small knife was immediately transformed into a hazy looking blade that she knew was called the smoke sword, it allowed him to generate and control some very dark grey smoke, it was a weapon he had told them was meant for retreating from a powerful enemy. She had to stop this before it escalated.

"Agatha," she said, her tone flat and annoyed, "please meet Adrian Black, Hero of the Sword and Bellamy, a member of my party. Adrian, Bellamy meet Agatha, magic obsessed maniac."

Her words disrupted the behaviour of both sides, Andrea felt a surge of _embarrassment/annoyance_ from Agatha but ignored it, the old woman should know better than to act in such a ridiculous manner, no matter how much she enjoyed learning about magic.

Adrian didn't change his mindset and still had his sword at the ready but he had given her a nod and indicated towards the witch, clearly expecting her to handle the old magic-user. Bellamy was far warier, no doubt he knew of Agatha's reputation for massive overkill but despite his fear of her, Andrea could tell that he was willing to take a hit or two, even if they would be fatal, so that he could give Adrian enough time to escape, his loyalty was quite admirable but unnecessary in this case.

She continued once she was certain that neither party was about to say anything," Agatha, we came here because Adrian had some interesting questions about magic and the Holy Sword. I am sure you can come to an agreement with him if you give him a chance."

Andrea wasn't particularly worried, Agatha had clearly shown her interest in the Legendary Weapon and Adrian would probably be able to get a good deal out of her.

"Hmph! Arrogant child!" the old woman stated," Don't you dare decide if I think this brat is worth speaking to." but her words didn't match her actions as she signalled them to come in. Andrea nodded at Adrian and Bellamy when they looked to her, she wanted to sigh at their clear scepticism but was grateful that they followed her lead.

Agatha wasn't as much of a horror as she seemed. Some of the time she was quite normal.

Once they were inside the atelier, Andrea realized that her assumption about the spell barriers outside was probably false, the whole place was a mess with fragments of some gemstones lying all around the place and clear signs of a mystical explosion marking the whole room. Agatha caught Andrea's look around the room and said," That is something you owe me for brats, that Sword of yours distracted me and ruined my experiment."

Adrian raised an eyebrow and said," That sounds like it was your mistake, Miss Agatha. I had imagined that someone who is supposed to be as skilled as you are would be willing to admit to such a thing, perhaps I was mistaken."

Andrea was a little surprised to see that Agatha was actually _amused _by Adrian's statement and the fact that Adrian had recognized that Agatha had just been attempting to get him on the back foot for negotiations.

"Rude brat," she said, her tone still showing her false irritation," clean this mess up, and ask your questions while you're at it. You'll be showing me that sword of yours once you're finished."

Adrian was now as amused as Agatha, it seemed that he had recognized that she was willing to entertain his request first before getting what she wanted.

"Thank you," he said politely, already moving to pick up some of the fragments and directing Bellamy towards a broon near the corner, "I appreciate the help. I suppose I should start from the basics, what exactly is status magic and how does it work?"

"Hah!" she stated," you go straight for the ridiculous questions don't you brat?" but despite her words Andrea could feel a sense of _approval _from the old woman, "I'll talk for as long as you keep working, and you can be damn sure that I'll be running some experiments on that Sword you're cursed with."

"Cursed with?" he asked a slight bit of _concern/horror/worry_ slipping into his mind.

"Not magically brat," she waved off his concerns," but you're going to be thrown at the waves until you die, that's a curse in its own right."

Bellamy jerked upwards from where he had knelt to pick up some of the smaller gem fragments, he opened his mouth about to say something but Adrian laughed loudly, stopping him in his tracks, Bellamy looked just as stunned as Andrea felt as she could feel Adrian's _amusement/vindication_ towards this whole situation.

"You have a very different reaction to this whole Hero thing than most people Miss Agatha."

The old woman raised her eyebrows as she sat down in her armchair," Don't believe me brat?" she asked.

He shrugged," What you say may very well be true, in fact, part of the reason why I am so desperate to get stronger is because I have no real idea how strong the waves are going to get, but what I was referring to was that you just said it straight to my face. It's rather refreshing to have someone tell me what they think so bluntly."

Adrian and the witch ignored him, instead, the witch cackled and said," Not as stupid as I thought you were," Andrea felt the flare of _approval/amusement_ pass through the Witch, "maybe you'll live past the year."

"Sir Hero... " muttered Bellamy, his clear horror/anger was clear to see.

Adrian just chuckled ignoring Bellamy save for waving a hand to silence him, "I certainly plan to do so," he said, "and if you are capable of more than just sly statements then my chances will improve. So, Status Magic?"

Agatha cackled again but capitulated and began to explain, it was fascinating and she could sense Adrian's emotions shift into curiosity more than anything as the conversation went on. After they had cleaned up the fragments of the gems, the three of them took a seat on the small chairs lying around the room, Andrea and Bellamy said nothing as the other two began to speak of increasingly esoteric ideas occasionally interspaced with insults and mockery.

Andrea could feel Adrian's control over his emotions slip as it was no longer needed, the deep-seated _anger/hate/determination_ did not vanish, but as he spoke to Agatha his emotions slowly shifted to _amusement/curiosity/interest._ The old woman was also interested in the conversation, her awe regarding the Holy Sword had not vanished, if anything it had flared up to an even greater level and every time Adrian demonstrated a feature of the Sword be it a transformation or pulling an item her emotions peaked again.

As the conversation continued Andrea found it very interesting how Bellamy was finding himself more and more confused while the Sword Hero was genuinely amused and rather relaxed. The contrast was fascinating.

It took nearly an hour before Agatha kicked them out, the old woman had extracted a promise from Adrian to return to her after empowering the Holy Sword further but didn't even bother saying goodbye before slamming the door shut behind them. But despite her rude and cranky behaviour and Adrian's often equally rude retaliations, Andrea had sensed a genuine connection being formed between Adrian and Agatha.

How odd that the first person that Adrian seemed to truly be fond of in her country was the rude old witch that had once slaughtered entire cities.

The surge of _satisfaction/joy/contentment_ from inside the shop and from the man beside her was surprisingly invigorating even if she knew that it would not last long.

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Adrian was still looking at his status screen even as he walked past the sparse crowds of the late evening. His conversation with Agatha had led him to change his sword form a dozen times and his emotions were altering between _disappointment/annoyance/determination _and_awe/joy/determination/victory._

He was testing something out and she was beginning to wonder what it could have been to drive away his negative emotions. It seemed however that Bellamy was also considering something but his emotional palette was purely negative. The man had not liked the way that Agatha had spoken about heroes.

"Sir Adrian...," he said, she could feel and hear his hesitation," I don't understand…when Lady Agatha spoke of the Heroes you were amused by it. She insulted you, the other Heroes and all the Heroes of the past…"

Adrian stopped walking and shut off his status screen, turning his full attention to Bellamy, she felt his emotions reach equilibrium again as he entered a near meditative state, "Miss Agatha was quite rude, that is undeniable, but I don't believe that she held any malice towards us Bellamy," the older man tried to interrupt here,Adrain silenced him with a raised hand," think about what she has done, rather than what she said."

Bellamy blinked for a second, unsure of what to say, his _anger/frustration_ giving away to_confusion/contemplation._

"She spoke to you about mundane magic and received payment by gaining an opportunity to study a Divine Weapon," he said finally, with none of his confusion diminished, his tone making it clear that he thought of it as a ridiculously unbalanced exchange.

"Close, but not quite." said Adrian with a smile," she helped me understand some of the particulars of the sword and how it relates to magic and granted me a great deal of insight into the nature of status magic. The only 'payment' she received was to study the weapon, something that she would have had to do just to fulfil my request."

He laughed here and _nostalgia/grief/joy_ mingled together to create a blinding combination of emotion for a moment.

"She was rude, crude and more than a little difficult, but in the end, all she did was a help."

Andrea had to wonder about whom Agatha reminded him off that he was able to pin down her personality so easily.

"Adrian is correct," said Andrea, remembering how the cranky old woman had taught Ethan despite the consistent complaints," I have known Agatha for as long as I can remember, she is not one to bother with people most of the time but she is not a bad person."

Andrea could tell that Bellamy was thinking about what they had said. Truthfully, it was a little impressive. Most of the church's soldiers were little more than brainwashes fools, for Bellamy to be able to even consider the opinion of another when they insulted the Saint Heroes was more than what she had expected of him.

Then again, it was one of those Saint Heroes who was telling him to think. It was probably a significant contributing factor as to why he was even bothering but this was not what she should be bothering with right now. Andrea needed to find a way to make sure that she reduced some of the Sword Heroes doubts regarding herself, and after his conversation with Agatha, she knew just what she had to do.

"I have to apologize to Lady Agatha," he said after they had walked for a minute or so in silence," I did not consider the depths of her actions and merely focused on the surface. Miss Andrea, Sir Adrian." he said, then he walked slightly ahead of them and bowed," Thank you for enlightening me. I will not forget this lesson."

For a moment she was a little confused as to what he was saying, then the previous conversation came up in her memories, a quick check showed that his emotions resonated with his oath and Andrea knew that he would not break his word. Andrea didn't think she could express just how surprised she was that he had changed his mind so quickly, was that wisdom or a simple desire to obey the Sword Hero?

"How very formal," said Adrian, but despite his words he was solemn, she could tell that he was genuinely _impressed_, "but your thanks are unnecessary. The credit should go to you, it is not easy to adopt a different perspective and mean it."

Bellamy looked like he disagreed," This is not the first time my judgement has been flawed sir. Father Andrew once said to me that 'deeds and not words should be the scale that one is judged by'. I had agreed with him then but it is clear that I have failed to apply it."

Adrian looked a little amused here," That does not change the fact that here and now you acted wisely. Have a little pride in your judgement Bellamy."

He nodded firmly but then looked a little hesitant before he said," Sir Adrian, Miss Andrea I need to reach my dormitories soon. I apologize for leaving abruptly, rest assured that I shall be prepared for our levelling trip on the day after tomorrow."

"Have a goodnight Bellamy," said Adrian honestly," and thank you for your help for these past few days. I cannot easily convey how valuable it was."

Andrea just nodded to him and Bellamy gave one last bow before bounding away towards the main church building. Adrian watched him leave, a complex set of rapidly changing emotions rising in his mind, Andrea didn't manage to catch all of it but what little she picked up made it clear that he was _conflicted _regarding Bellamy.

Andrea sighed, once again the lack of trust was rearing its head.

She honestly wishes that the Hero was completely right or absolutely wrong with his mindset, but Andrea knew that his current state of mistrust was probably the wisest way for him to think right now. The problem was that instead of the situation improving with time the Church, through Bellamy, and Princess Malty were likely to make it worse.

"Adrian I need to inform you of a few critical pieces of information." she said before she lost her courage.

Andrea could sense exactly when Adrian processed her sentence, his emotions spiked for a single moment before he entered a state that was quite similar to his combat mindset, but when he spoke it sounded almost normal," I see. And this information is about?"

"The current political situation in Melromarc and the world, the reason why I joined you and who helped me do so as well as some information on Bellamy and the Princess," she spoke as plainly as she could, trying to keep her senses fully trained on him while preventing herself from losing control. It was foolish to bet so much on this one conversation but she could tell that Adrian needed someone to trust or he was likely to abandon the whole party. He may have meant his promise back in the forest, but that had been impulse not thought. It was far from a guarantee.

Her eyes told her nothing but her empathic sense screamed at her loud and clear.__

_Surprise/wonder/concern_. Perfect.

"And what is it that you wished to say about them?" he asked, his body tense but his expression clear.

"Melromarc was not meant to summon all four heroes, instead each major nation, Siltvelt, Faubey, Melromarc and Zeltoble were meant to be able to summon one each." she said, stating the most inconsequential fact first, a fact that affected her the least but would guarantee that he would certainly not trust Malty or Bellamy fully," from what my father said had it not been for the waves, we would have already been at war. Even now we are on the brink of war, and if anything goes wrong from here on out, war shall be inevitable."

She paused to see if he had anything to say and gauge his emotional state, but he simply waved for her to continue, she nodded and said,"I joined you because I need to fight the waves but that was only possible thanks to my father helping me out," she tried not to think about her friends and the_despair/determination/anger_ that they felt in their last moments," My father is the Head of the Adventurers Guild here in Melromarc, he has more than enough influence to ensure that I had a chance to join you. It's part of my deal with him, I can only fight with a party powerful enough to keep me alive and if I class up before the next wave."

"I see, so you have been spying on me on behalf of your father while gathering the strength you needed to be able to avenge your former party," he said calmly, but what stunned her was that she could feel a sense of _approval/interest _coming from his mind.

"You don't seem to mind," she asked before she could stop herself.

She felt his surprise before she could even realize that she had reacted to an emotion he had not shown at all, but he didn't react beyond a shrug and said,"It is not that I like being spied on Andrea, but it is something to be expected, after all the Legendary Heroes have the potential for a lot of power, it would be utterly ridiculous for the people of this world to just summon us and then leave us without any monitoring whatsoever. You telling me this is a little odd, but I suppose that there are more subtle spies watching over us as well."

"There probably are," she confirmed, the shadows of the Queen and the Church were a risk, but this late in the evening, the mindset of a shadow was like a beacon, all _devotion/determination/focus_ of a very particular flavour, it was hard to miss. And right now there were no watchers, it was part of the reason why she had jumped into the conversation at this instant.

Adrian nodded, his emotions were odd,_impatience/determination/concern_ rather than he curiosity and caution she had expected, "Let's continue this conversation at another time Andrea." he said," And thank you for telling me a part of the truth I appreciate it."

"Don't you want to know more," she asked, a little puzzled as to why he was willing to wait until he got some information from her.

"I do, and we shall speak of this tomorrow." he stated," meet me out in the fields to the west of the city at about 6 in the evening. Goodbye."

"Wai-" she started but before she could finish the word he vanished, one of his more commonly used skills removing him from her sight in an instant and worse out of the range of her empathic skills as well.

What had just happened?!

Andrea had been certain that he would have drilled her for information not just run away at the moment she had been about to tell him about the Church and the Royal Family.

There was something very odd about this, but there was little she could do right now, she just had to hope that Adrian hadn't decided to just leave. Hope that she hadn't just ruined the best chance she had of fighting the waves.

*************************************************************************


	11. Chapter 11 (Raphtalia I)

**Raphtalia POV:**

Raphtalia let out a ragged cough and winced as the shaking of her body opened her wounds slightly. She took a deep breath in, trying to stop the coughing. She knew that if she made too much noise then she would be punished just like how she had heard the trader punish the slave in the cage that was next to her.

Her coughs continued despite her best efforts and her fear grew in response but luck was on her side. The pain didn't start.

Raphtalia didn't know how long she had spent in the cage. Her throat was dry and her stomach empty, so she was sure that it had been at least a day since she had been thrown in here but she didn't know much else. She wondered if this was the day that she would die on.

Her hunger and fatigue slowly swept away from her thoughts and she spent some time in a daze, she had no idea how long it had been when the sound of footsteps shattered her reverie. Raphtalia paid it no mind. This was not the first time, and it probably wouldn't be the last that she heard a customer come in. Some had seen her before but none of them gave her a second glance. Raphtalia knew that she would die here.

The sounds grew louder and clearer.

"...many options yes sir!" said the cheerful voice of the Slaver.

"Irrelevant. You have been informed of my specifications. Your only concern should be if you can meet them." said a cold voice in response.

"Of course sir! We are here in fact." said the slave trader, and Raphtalia was forced out of her ennui as the fabric around her cage was ripped away.

The light blinded her for a long time, so she couldn't see the men who were in front of her cage and her distraction prevented her from listening to most of what had been said, but the last statement was something she heard loud and clear.

"She will suffice."

Raphtalia felt her heart began to beat faster in response as her fear came back to life.

"Excellent sir!" said the trader while opening the cage. He scarcely looked at her before signalling that she should leave with his cane, a wide smile on his face.

Raphtalia obeyed quickly. She didn't want to be hurt again.

Once outside she got her first look at her new master. He was tall and she could tell that he was a man but a heavy hooded cloak and mask prevented her from being able to understand anything else. He had a bag at his side held in one hand while his other was hidden.

Raphtalia involuntarily took a step backwards, but the slave trader's voice stopped her from doing anything more.

"Now then sir, the matter of payment-"

"You shall have two gold coins for all the purchases put together." said the hooded man," And there shall be no need for you to brand the girl. Just remove your crest from her and our business shall be complete."

"I see! A new method of branding!" said the man, sounding even more excited than before," Would you be interested in perhaps sharin-"

"Do we have a deal merchant?" interrupted the voice coldly.

The plump man caught himself and said," Of course, sir! Please head right this way and I shall remove the slave's crest. I would be very grateful if you would show me the application process you use! Indeed I would-"

"That will not be possible." stated her master in a flat voice.

"Now sir, surely-"

The conversation continued in this vein as Raphtalia was taken away from the cages and into a small well-furnished room. The trader poured a cold fluid on her chest and for a moment it really hurt but then the pain was gone. For just a moment Raphtalia felt nice, despite her back and legs hurting but then she saw the hooded man and her fear returned.

"We are finished here trader." he said and grabbed her hand," Let's go child."

He moved out of the tent quickly, not responding to the slavers goodbye. Raphtalia looked up at him again and wondered how long she would survive.

The master led her into a really big city. There were a lot of buildings close by and even though she could see that the sky was dark , the streets were bright with colour and had lots of people. It was really strange to see so many people out at night.

For a moment she wondered if there was a festival, but the lack of music and loud sounds made it clear that this was nothing like that. Raphtalia wondered just how it could be so bright.

The master was still holding onto her hand but unlike when they had just left the trader he was walking slowly, so it didn't hurt as much when she walked. The itchy cloth that she was wearing made her wounds feel worse but she didn't say anything. She had heard what the slave trader had said, her new master would be putting a crest on her later, she didn't want him to punish her.

They stopped near a big fountain where she could see a big shiny crystal that was giving out a lot of light. Her master led her to the raised lip of the fountain and then had her sit down. He kept standing.

"What is your name child?" he asked, and Raphtalia was a little stunned to realize just how...different he sounded from before.

"Raphtalia," she said, and then remembered to say," Master."

"I see," he replied," Raphtalia, I am not your master. I will not be applying the crest on you, nor am I going to enslave you in any other way."

"Yes master" she replied quickly. Not sure of what he wanted from her, she felt confused and scared. The other masters had never done something like this but she knew that he was playing a game with her as they had been.

He sighed and Raphtalia winced, half expecting the pain in her chest to start. But all that happened was him suddenly showing her a small glass bottle, which he was holding in a hand that had not had anything just a second ago!

"I see that this will take some time." he said," Child this contains some medicine. It should help you with your wounds both internal and external and is perfectly safe. Please drink it."

Then he kept the bottle right next to her and took a step back.

She looked at the bottle and then back at him, she reached for the bottle then hesitated. For a long instant, she waited for the pain to start, for it to punish her slow response but then remembered that she didn't have a crest.

Then realization struck her. This was a test. Her new master wanted to see how far she would go without a crest. Raphtalia didn't know why he was doing this but he wanted to see if she would obey without the pain.

She swallowed her fear and took a look back at the hooded man, he was still impossible to read and said nothing when she looked at him. Raphtalia quickly looked away and turned back to the bottle. She could feel her breathing getting shorter as fear began to rise again.

Then," Child," she heard," I promise you that it is just medicine. Try a small amount of it and I promise that if you do not like it then I shall not force you to drink it."

Raphtalia's head snapped towards her master and then back to the small bottle. She didn't believe him but she slowly reached for the bottle, it opened easily enough and a minty smell filled her senses.

It was nice.

Raphtalia lifted it to her mouth slowly, allowing only a few drops in. For a moment she tasted nothing, then she found her body glowing slightly, the pain throughout her body just vanishing as if it had never been there.

She just stared at the still mostly full bottle and then looked back at her master.

It really was medicine. Tasty medicine at that.

She drank the rest of it down in a single swallow.

The lingering pains and aches simply disappeared. Pain that she had simply forgotten about or ignored for so long that it had become the norm vanished and her body felt lighter than it had in weeks.

"Feeling better Raphtalia?" asked her Master.

She nodded quickly while trying not to smile, masters didn't like that.

"Good," he said," We shall have a meal a little bit later okay? First, we need to leave the city."

She nodded and got up off the fountain. The lack of pain in her feet surprised her.

He held his hand out and she took it and followed.

Raphtalia was struggling to understand the hooded man. He had given her really good medicine. No one had never had ever given her such good medicine that made all the pain go away instantly.

She didn't understand why he would give that to his slave.

It took them a little time until they reached the walls of the city. It looked much bigger from up close and the walls were the biggest thing around except for the fancy looking tower that she could see on the opposite end of the city. That was even bigger.

Her master wandered around for a little bit, going closer and closer to the walls until they were directly underneath it. Then he turned to her and said," child I am going to pick you up. When I tell you to close your eyes, you must keep it closed until I tell you to open them. Is that clear?" his voice had taken a sharp tone towards the end.

"Yes, sir," she said, nodding quickly.

He nodded as well, the motion almost swallowed up by his clothing. Then he closed his eyes and quickly picked her up.

He had moved so fast that she hadn't even gotten a chance to react but once she was held in his arms firmly she stiffened. He ignored it and said, " Eyes closed child."

She obeyed and then a single instant later she felt an odd sense of movement. It was like someone had thrown her up in the air and then she was just floating there. For a moment she wondered what was happening but the man's warning to keep her eyes closed killed any desire she had of opening her eyes. He had been very scary when he said that.

She didn't know how long it had been before she heard him say," You can open your eyes child," and let her down but when she looked around the city and its' walls were gone!

Raphtalia turned around on the spot, trying to spot the walls and the city but all she saw around her were trees-No wait, he could see the walls from here but they were so far away! It would take her a long time to get back there.

She turned her eyes to the man and was then met with another surprise. The man had taken off his mask and his hood and was looking at her with a small smile. He looked much younger than she had expected, definitely younger than her father. He had black hair and eyes that were the same colour as coal.

To her surprise, he didn't look very scary. Why was he wearing the mask then?

"Are you okay Raphtalia?" he asked," _Dash _can be a little disorienting."

She nodded and he continued," Good. Now there is a small clearing about a kilometre or so in that direction." he said pointing away from the city," Let's have a short meal there."

He started walking and she quickly made to follow but he stopped abruptly, " Wait a second. Raphtalia I am sending you an invite to my party please accept it."

Raphtalia blinked in surprise but then her Status magic flared up.

_**Adrian Black has sent you a party invitation. Do you accept?**_

"Adrian?" she whispered, was that her master's name?

"Raphtalia?" he asked and she was startled out of her contemplation. She quickly accepted the invitation and then started to walk at his side, holding his hand after he offered it to her.

_********************************************************************************_

Author's note: This chapter is something I am still not happy with but I figured that I've delayed long enough. Any suggestion regarding improvements would be greatly appreciated.


	12. Chapter 12

Adrian kept his _Blindsight _active and used his SP to boost the skill a little to ensure maximum range but there didn't seem to be any followers. It was a little odd how the skill had been glitching around a few locations but a quick check using his other perception skills and even a visit had revealed nothing.

Was it simple paranoia?

He tried to shrug it off but it stayed on his mind until he reached the small clearing he had first found using _Blindsight_. It had been a fairly short distance but Raphtalia was still a little tired out by the walk.

Good, that would be helpful for later.

"Raphtalia, please get yourself cleaned properly at the stream there," he said, pointing at the small stream about a hundred meters from the clearing, "after you're done then please dry yourself and wear this."

He gave her a small bundle of cloth consisting of a towel and a simple pair of clothing consisting of shorts and a shirt. It was actually made using his _Tailoring _skill after he had bought her, his appraisal skills and _Blindsight _had given him the dimensions needed.

Raphtalia nodded and then ran towards the stream, the undercurrent of fear in all her actions driving her forward. It pissed him off seeing just how badly any sign of disobedience had been beaten out of her.

Adrian sighed and shook off his emotions. Now was not the time.

Adrian quickly scanned the area, kept the Filolial eggs and the bottles of enchanted fluid down and then set up a few simple detection traps while keeping Raphtalia in his sight at all times.

The area around them didn't have many monsters. He killed and absorbed them easily enough, it was a bit of a surprise when Raphtalia levelled up twice due to them but it wasn't too odd. She had just been at level one after all.

When he returned to the site, Raphtalia was back and was standing around looking scared and worried in her new clothing. It was remarkable how a small wash, new clothing and a bit of healing could change a person.

The broken child from before looked very different but her ears and tail still felt very, very odd to him. Like she was wearing the best cosplay he had ever seen but his mind insisted that they were not real, despite the fact that _Blindsight _let him see that they were biological constructs.

"Let's have a meal shall we," he said, trying to stay positive and _not _think of all the children back in the city.

He led her to the center of the clearing and then pulled out a small set of chairs and a table that he had made using his _Carpentry _skill. And then served a simple meal which consisted of grilled meat and some herbs.

It was quite strange to think that he was basically eating magically prepared and stored food while sitting on magically made furniture...but this was his life now, no matter how absurd it felt.

Raphtalia was a little stunned at the sudden appearance of the food and the furnishings but a look from him had her seated at the table. He frowned slightly when he noted that she was actually having a little bit of trouble eating.

Then he realized that it was late at night, there were no light sources and Raphtalia didn't have his _Nightvision _skill. Adrian considered the problem for a second even as he picked up the bag with the eggs and the bottles and sat down before simply switching his Sword form to the _candle sword_.

Immediately the whole place was illuminated quite well. Raphtalia blinked repeatedly for a moment before staring at the oddly shaped sword in his hand.

"Continue eating and pay me no mind child," he said, feeling a little amused at her surprise.

She nodded vigorously and said "Yes!" Adrian chose to ignore how she was crying and wiping away her tears, trying to hide them from him. He didn't know why she was crying but asking her about it would just scare her.

Adrian kept the two Filolial eggs down on the floor in their incubators but pulled out the two bottles, careful to keep them out of Raphtalia's sight. He moved his sword down and swiftly absorbed them both.

_**Cursed Seal Sword Unlocked  
Seal Removal Sword Unlocked  
Slavers Sword Unlocked **_

Adrian frowned slightly as he opened up the swords and studied them. Half a minute later Adrian felt himself re-reading the words again.

_**Slavers Sword (Unmastered)(1/30) : Lv 1 1.00%  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Uncommon  
Enchantments: None  
Attack Rating : 1  
Defence Rating:1  
Speed Rating : 1  
Stamina Rating : 1  
Magic Rating : 1  
Soul Rating : 1  
Status Enchantments : None  
Equip Boosts : None  
Equip Skills: Slave Stat Growth(small) ; Slave Maturation Adjustment(small) ; Slave Skill Growth(small)  
Special Ability: None**_

_**Cursed Seal Sword (Unmastered)(1/30) : Lv 1 1.00%  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Uncommon  
Enchantments: None  
Attack Rating : 1  
Defence Rating:1  
Speed Rating : 1  
Stamina Rating : 1  
Magic Rating : 1  
Soul Rating : 1  
Status Enchantments : None  
Equip Boosts : None  
Equip Skills: None  
Special Ability: Cursed Seal Application**_

_**Seal Removal Sword (Unmastered)(1/30) : Lv 1 1.00%  
Energy Level 0/100  
Rarity: Uncommon  
Enchantments: None  
Attack Rating : 1  
Defence Rating:1  
Speed Rating : 1  
Stamina Rating : 1  
Magic Rating : 1  
Soul Rating : 1  
Status Enchantments : None  
Equip Boosts : MP +2; SP +2  
Equip Skills: Magic Critical Detection  
Special Ability: Remove Seals;**_

He could enslave people and monsters and then boost their growth. Sure he could also free them but he could bind people to himself and then force them to serve him.  
Adrian wanted to throw it away and never use the sword again but hadn't he just met a piece of scum who deserved to be enslaved and used in the same way he bought and sold people as a _business_.

But more than that was the temptation to use the Slaver series to boost Raphtalia's growth. The sword hadn't been upgraded at all but a small amount of energy and material sacrificed would have its' effects elevated and then he could ensure that she would have more power than normal. He could leave her be to her life later on with a lighter heart knowing that she would have the power to defend herself better.

All he had to do was curse the girl with a seal of obedience and ignore the fear in her eyes as he did so.

What a fucking joke. Free her and then turn around and enslave her not an hour later.

No. He wasn't going to do it, good intentions or not. Worst case scenario if he couldn't find another growth-boosting method he would take a little longer with her, level her up more than the level 30 or so he had planned, get her a class up and push her to level 60 or something and make sure to teach her magic. Better than enslaving her.

Still, he would upgrade that damned sword. It delivered a fate worse than death and that would be useful in this world.

Adrian took a moment to check on the sleeping girl and then started to move.

A moment and he had absorbed the table, chair and other materials. Another and he had the incubators in a small backpack tied securely to his person.

A flare of his _Map_, the skill he had obtained from his _Cartographers sword _and he oriented himself correctly and then picked up Raphtalia.

She was light, a result of both her own weight and his own slightly superhuman strength, so he effortlessly lifted her and held on tightly, bracing her neck carefully.  
Raphtalia didn't stir. It wasn't because she was exhausted, though she was quite tired, it was because he had drugged the girl. Her second serving of food had consisted of meat, some herbs and a dose of sleeping potion. It was the safest way to move her and the only way to make sure she got some rest.

Then he triggered his Dash skill and started his journey to the wilds north of the capital.

The area he sought to go to was untouched by people and infested by monsters that most humans preferred not to deal with, not just because they were too powerful but because they bred like crazy. Their numbers multiplying in short order and rapidly taking over large regions for themselves. Adrian was heading towards Dragon Territory.

It was nearly a hundred kilometres just to get to the foot of the mountains where the territory started and he had no vehicle or beast of burden to carry him. But the simple reality was that he was superhuman.

Dash let him cover a distance of two kilometres, give or take a couple of hundred meters, every ten seconds. Friction, gravity, air resistance, drag force...none of these things mattered. He moved at a speed decided by his speed stat and nothing more. The only cost? 0.1% of his SP and a twenty-second cooldown if he used the power for the full ten seconds and a proportionally smaller cooldown if he used it for a lesser amount of time.

Adrian had equipped a sword with a speed and SP regen status boost so that meant that he covered nearly 2.3 kilometres and it cost him only 0.05% of his SP.

Thus Dash alone would let him travel his 100-kilometre distance in less than an hour. Adrian could also simply run. With his speed stat that was nearly 80 per cent of the Level 75 Werewolf slave that he had seen he could reach speeds of 30-40 meters per second if he was running at about 60% of his maximum. For short bursts, he could reach even greater speeds.

Sounds absurd right? How could a person run at speeds that even the greatest runners on Earth could not hope to match? The answer was simple and blatantly obvious. The speed stat.

According to Agatha's explanation, it enhanced all movement. The speed of a person, the rate of movement of a limb or the body as a whole, the speed at which attacks travelled or even the speed at which a person threw an object was subject to this stat. Physics? Biology? Fuck all that.

But this all came at an interesting cost. Adrian had enough of a perception stat that he could think at very high speeds, a processing speed needed to move so quickly in a safe manner. That meant that he could think back to what Blindsight had revealed to him, and all of the people in the city that he had chosen to ignore simply because it was inconvenient to do so.

Adrian was aware that it was not his fault, nor was it his responsibility. The poverty-stricken families, the street rats, the thousands of enslaved demihumans. All of these things were a result of complex, long-standing socio-political issues. He knew this. Earth despite its relative prosperity still struggled with income inequality, poverty and a host of other issues, he could hardly say that this world was unique in the suffering of their people. Hell for all he knew this world might have a better reason than most.

Still, he could not think of any reason that was justification enough to torture children and throw their corpses out like trash. Adrian wanted to go back and kill that fucker who had decided to throw the corpses of those abused children in a fucking pile at the back of his tent probably to be used as monster feed or something. But he couldn't. Not yet. Not until he was powerful enough to survive the aftermath. Not until he could help these people safely.

It had been the wise thing to do. The smart thing to do. Yet he felt wretched. Helping this girl whom he held in his arms right now was something but it was far from enough.

It was akin to emptying an ocean with a bloody teaspoon. A futile effort.

Adrian was glad that he had helped her. Even if his reasons were nothing more than self-satisfaction but he knew that it was nothing in the grand scheme of things.  
He really hated this world.

Adrian tried to focus on his journey. He was doing something incredible, moving as fast as a car, it was just a pity that it took no real attention or effort from him.

Hell, it took putting in the same effort it took to jog, and barely disturbing the ground beneath his feet to move at 35 meters a second without the support of a skill.  
It felt like he was being pushed; like each step was being artificially enhanced or like someone was redefining distance and time so that he covered larger distances with each step despite barely putting in the effort.

The whole situation was surreal. But the results were undeniable. It took him thirty minutes to cover one hundred kilometres and at the end of it he wasn't even out of breath, the girl in his arms was soundly asleep and the eggs were safe and sound in their incubators.

*****************************************************************************

Adrian had been in this forested region for less than two hours and yet he had faced 386 monsters. Truthfully he would have lost count had it not been for his status magic tracking it for him.

The area itself had the annoying combination of dense foliage and rough terrain. This fact in combination with the monsters made it a very difficult place to navigate. For an ordinary adventurer or even a small army, the difficulty in moving through the place and the constant ambushes by monsters would have been taxing.

Hunting through this region in the dead of night after a long day of travel and combat should have been impossibly stressful, especially since he had to protect a young child and two eggs.

It wasn't.

Adrian felt relieved as he cut down monster after monster. It was easy and he had unlocked and mastered more than nine hundred forms since he had entered the forest and gained hundreds of drop items. Better yet Raphtalia had grown by 14 levels and Adrian himself had levelled up by one.

It took all his attention, consistent use of _Nightvision_ and _Blindsight _and several combat skills but in the end, he could keep up with the monsters. It was truly wonderful to have an enemy that he could _deal _with. No complications, no irritating emotions nothing. Just a simple slaughter.

Adrian had to wonder just when it had become so very simple to fight giant monsters. Frogs that were bigger than he was, odd-looking eight-limbed lizards, two-headed snakes, massive five-meter long birds...he had fought a menagerie of beasts it was amazing and yet in a way relaxing considering that all of the monsters he had faced had died in a single hit. Perhaps in the future, it might become dull to be faster and stronger than every single monster but for now, it was convenient. More often than not _Blindsight _let him see them before they could sense him but even if they went on the attack the simple reality was that he was much faster than they were. His speed stat, especially when combined with his perception stat, did more than just allow him to run faster.

Reflexes, hand-eye coordination, information processing, attack speed...all of them had improved and the status enchantment that allowed for SP preservation and regeneration ensured that he could use his skills freely.

Thanks to being free from the spies and manipulators from his party he could even use his skills to their full potential and even use the skills that he had decided to keep hidden from them. Adrian might have left them impulsively upon realizing that Andrea had a mental manipulation ability but it was still the right decision to make.

Adrian had no real idea what power the girl had but she had been able to react to changes in conversation and the actions of people before they had shown any sign of it.  
Agatha's sudden entrance, Bellamy's words and actions and even his own expression had been reacted to before any sign was shown. Adrian would not have noticed it had he not used the perception boost that _Dash _provided but once he did notice it...there was no way to miss just how effortlessly she reacted in _just _the right way.

Precognition or something along the lines of mind-reading or mental alteration was his best bet but he suspected that it was mental given that she had shown no sign of using the precog power in combat. Adrian had no desire to stay around a potential mental magic-user. It was way too risky. It was possible he was wrong but he doubted it.

Adrian had deemed her a lesser threat, had trusted in her information and had even felt a great deal of sympathy for her. Could that have been genuine? Yes. But he considered it far more likely that she had some sort of subtle ability to influence his mind to an extent. Not outright mind control perhaps but something that let her influence him and alter his behaviour. It was the perfect way to control a Hero and Adrian felt like a fool for not considering the fact that they would not have used such tools to control him.

Still, some good had come out of it. He looked towards Raphtalia who was floating alongside him in her wooden carrier, dead to the world.

Adrian would not have dared to rescue her if he hadn't been leaving the party behind. After all, the Hero of the Sword could not show demi-humans pity nor aid them without being declared a false hero.

The risks of helping her were undeniable but in the end, he had not been able to just leave her to rot in that cage. It was foolish to think that he could raise a child when he had nothing save for the Sword. Sure he could feed her, clothe her and give her the medicine she needed. Hell, he was almost uniquely capable of levelling her. But the reality was that she was always at the risk of dying while she was with him.

Raphtalia and the two Filolial eggs that Adrian had bought from that piece of trash were kept inside a wooden carrier that he had created with a combination of two of his crafting skills. _Carpentry _and _Tailoring_. He had unlocked both skills on his first day.

Adrian had used _Carpentry _to create a bed-like structure with a raised edge using the Status Menu, in fact, the whole set up to create the design had been a lot like AutoCAD, so he had little trouble in making his design. It had been easy to make with a large cavity for Raphtalia to sit or sleep in and two smaller spaces for the incubators. He had then covered the wooden construct with some thick cloth made by his _Tailoring _skill.

All in all, this had taken him no more than fifteen minutes in total. But the most important part was that he had also designed two slots where he could project his swords using _Sword Projection_. Given that his skill allowed him to create and telekinetically control his swords flawlessly, this ensured that he could telekinetically lift the whole wooden carrier with ease and have it move around with him without compromising his mobility.

Plus the _Sword Projections_ embedded in the wooden construct could fire of_Sword Beams_ if need be. Combined with _Blindsight _to keep track of both his enemies and his dependants it allowed for a reasonable degree of security.

It was a good system. Hell, it was a brilliant system that allowed for mobility, attack and let her get some much-needed rest. But it was still not completely safe. It never could be. He had to find a place for her to live before the first wave hit. His mind went to the timer and then he began his hunt again.

_**29:12:24:29**_

He didn't have time to waste.

He flared his _Blindsight_, the skill quickly expanded into its kilometre radius range and let him glimpse the numerous monsters in range. More than half of them were awake but none of them were very close to him. Adrian didn't bother gathering much information on them, the chances of them surviving his initial volley was next to zero.

Adrian commanded the swords in the wooden carrier to stay in their current position and then triggered _Dash _to move vertically upwards.

Then while holding the positions of the monsters in his mind he activated the _One Hundred Swords_ skill. An ability that was akin to his _Blade Projection_ skill in that it created swords but very different in SP cost, durability, damage and number. It was inferior to_Blade Projection _in every way in terms of quality but it allowed him to create more swords with a lesser overall SP cost.

In a situation like this where he had to target about fifty weaklings that were in such convenient range? It was perfect.

At first ten blades launched from his sword, each of the ten then produced ten more blades before crashing into their targets like meteors. Most of the monsters died but three of them had survived the assault simply by moving.

Thankfully they were all in the same direction. Adrian triggered his _Dash_ again and launched himself in that direction after landing on the ground he ran normally letting _Blindsight _guide him until he was right next to the first monster.

It was called _Minor Fire Drake_ a dragon-like monster he had faced before. It was nothing special, about five meters long with multiple hearts but only one brain. It could breathe out fire but Adrian simply ran up to it and stabbed it in the brain. The beast didn't even have time to react.

The other two died just as easily but he killed them from range using two _Air Strike Slashes_. Dull but SP efficient.

Adrian switched his sword to his dismantling one which had a powerful SP regeneration status enchantment and then activated his Blindsight in full. Keeping careful track of Raphtalia and the two filolial eggs while moving around and absorbing the corpses. It took nearly three-fourths of an hour to do so and return to Raphtalia so that he could continue his hunt.

It was truly stunning how it took no real time to kill them but a lot of time to harvest the monsters and any plants in the area. Still, the stats, skills and drop items were nothing to laugh at so he continued his current pattern.

The next hour was far duller. He didn't encounter any real monster hotspots like the one before so he took them out in two's and three's at most. It was far less efficient but his experience gains far almost constant so he didn't complain. Adrian was starting to realize that it would take at least twenty thousand monsters to get to level fifty though. Hell, it would probably take more than that given that during his little killing spree Raphtalia had gotten to level 17 while he was still stuck on 33. He had expected that it would take him longer but the difference was more severe than expected. Less than 10% on the way to level 34 and Raphtalia had levelled up three times in the process.

He couldn't see her stats without her permission but with her being a target of the companion series, which he had unlocked with some of her hair, they were likely to be high. He could only hope that the upgrades that he had subjected the series to were worth it. He still wasn't sure exactly what_stat growth enhancement (medium) _actually meant.

Adrian pushed away the unnecessary thoughts. He would deal with things as they came. No point in worrying about something that was likely to be positive. It was really annoying that these monsters had already ceased to be a threat, he was getting used to the forest, his combat method was getting more and more efficient and his stats had gotten a fair boost in the past few hours. Sure it was a little annoying that of the 1000 plus swords forms that he had unlocked precisely none of them had a combat skill but the stat boost and crafting skills were nothing bad.

And there he was drifting again.

He shook it off and focused on his _Blindsight_, he resolved to get some rest after half an hour. Of course the barely a minute after this he encountered his first proper dragon.

It was truly massive. Nearly fifteen meters long with two heads, four hearts and oddly enough six legs and some sort of odd stumps in place of wings. It was like some sort of mutated classic western dragon. Frankly, Adrian had given up on biology in general regarding monsters but a five chambered heart in a reptile made no sense, especially since the other three hearts were three-chambered hearts. It was honestly like someone had decided to just plug in more organs into the body for the hell of it.  
At the moment it was nearly half a kilometre away so Adrian carefully expanded the range of his Blindsight checked for other monsters in the vicinity and once their absence was confirmed started to prepare for what was probably his toughest fight to date.

First, he projected Eight swords, joining the two he already had floating around him. Then he left the carrier behind, no point taking her close to the beast, and changed his Sword form to the heavily upgraded _Pyramid Tortoise Sword_ so that he could use _Sword Beam_ with impunity.

Then he _Dashed _forward towards the sleeping beast. His ten blades locked in place around him at the ready, once he neared the dragon it began to stir but Adrian was ready. He kept the perception enhancement and send six of his swords targeting the critical locations on the dragon.

Skin, flesh and bone offered no resistance as the two heads and the hearts were pierced in an instant. The Dragon didn't even get a chance to scream before it died.  
For a moment Adrian kept the remaining four projections active and ready, his Sword ready to blast the dragon if it so much as twitched. Then he got the Exp gain notification and felt a massive flare of disappointment that surprised him.

Had he really been looking forward to a fight?

Adrian ignored his idiotic thought and retreated back to the carrier before heading back to the_Major Hydra Dragon_. It would probably take at least fifteen minutes to butcher the thing. Best to keep Raphtalia as close as possible given that he would be in the same location.

He switched to his Dismantling Sword while using the projections to cut up the beast into more manageable sections. Absorbing the dragon piecemeal was wise but it was also tedious. For all that the Dismantling Sword helped by making the cuts deeper than they should be and by cutting flesh and bone with equal ease and even guiding him to cut in _just_ the right places, it didn't change the simple reality that cutting a giant monster was time-consuming and quite disgusting.

He was about halfway through consuming the monster when a scream lanced through the forest. A human scream. Without any thought, his sword shifted form to the one with the greatest attack and speed rating and he flared his _Blindsight _to full power while dragging the carrier closer to him.

Then he realized that the scream was Raphtalia. The girl had just woken up and seen a huge dead dragon.

He turned towards her and _Dashed _to her position despite the fact that she was quite close and then the thought hit. He had dragged the carrier closer to himself and the bloody dragon. Absolutely wonderful. He was a total idiot.

When he saw the shivering girl who, from what he could smell, had managed to urinate all over herself he truly felt out of his depth. How in hell was he supposed to raise a child in a situation like this?

He steeled himself regardless. It was his responsibility now, he no longer had a choice.

Of course, his resolve didn't give him an answer to the obvious question. How was he supposed to help the girl whom he might as well have traumatized again?


	13. Chapter 13

**Adrian POV  
**

Adrian walked through the forest with Raphtalia in his arms. The girl had gone back to sleep after he had managed to calm her down, the exhaustion and shock must have knocked her out again.

He had tried to place her in the carrier but the girl had started to squirm and mutter, clearly uncomfortable until he picked her up again. Adrian tried to think but the guilt of putting the child through yet another traumatic event surged up. He truly was a fool.

He would take this chance to get some rest and wait for the eggs to hatch, according to the timer on his status screen he would have to wait for about an hour for them to emerge. Better use that chance to create a small camp where he could rest for the moment. Adrian was moving towards the edge of Dragon territory. He was still moving east, away from the capital but instead of moving deeper north into the monster-infested zone he was moving slightly towards the less dangerous areas.

With his speed, _dash _and _Blindsight _it didn't take long to find a good spot. Adrian marked out a few good locations for some traps and noted that a river was fairly close by, but not too close. It was as good an area as he was likely to find.

He allowed the carrier to land gently on the ground before placing Raphtalia inside it. Traps and monster killing first. Then he would worry about cleaning up and feeding the child.

It didn't take long. His sword made most of the parts for the traps and the _trapping _and _hunting _skills filled in any gaps in his understanding of their applications. It was disconcerting to realize that knowledge of what traps to make, how to use those traps and even which traps to use for the best results had been embedded into his brain but given all the changes that were being made to him, this was perhaps nothing special.

The traps were nothing special, just an early warning system to warn him if anything arrived in the vicinity. There should be nothing but caution was wiser than allowing a moment of laziness or overconfidence leading to death.

Raphtalia was still asleep but her expressions made it clear that it was not a comfortable rest. Adrian went back to the site with a _Dash_. He set up the campfire and then slowly began to cook some food normally.

He drew out the prepared meat and herbs along with some bread that was made from some of the wild grains he had picked up here and there. He used some steel utensils to make a reasonable meal. It would have been easier to have the system in the Sword to make the food...but he just wanted to enjoy himself a little. The situation was very different but this reminded him of when he had gone camping with his friends...though they'd really screwed up the food back then. Best to avoid that.

It took some time but the aroma began to spread a little and Adrian ensured that it spread to Raphtalia who was right next to him. It was strangely adorable to see the child wake up slowly while drool escaped her mouth. She only fully woke up when her stomach grumbled.

She turned to him in surprise. All other concerns giving way to fear. He wanted to sigh but chose to smile at her instead. He hoped that it would put her at ease.

"Raphtalia," he said with a nod," Dinner will be ready in a few minutes." indicating the small pan he was holding.

"Umm...yes sir," she said, her attention drifting towards the food as her stomach grumbled at her again.

Adrian had to laugh at her utterly embarrassed expression.

"I'll take you to a nearby river, you can get refreshed and change into something more comfortable," he said, Adrian had a few drop items that could actually change size. Given that he could see that she had actually grown a few centimeters it would be best to assume that normal clothing would not be sufficient.

Raphtalia nodded, her embarrassment flaring again but she said nothing.

Adrian drew the table and other furniture out from the storage space in the sword. Quickly arranged the utensils and then picked up the Filolial eggs. No need to leave them here when there was a small possibility of a monster being attracted by the smell. After securely tying them to his back he looked to Raphtalia and saw that she was holding out her arms.

Adrian had to suppress his surprise. This child...she was truly adaptable.

He picked her up quickly and then said," Eyes closed child," she obeyed with a nod and buried her head in his chest.

A moment to check his surroundings with _Blindsight _and he was off with _dash_. They were at the river in less than two seconds. He let Raphtalia down and she opened her eyes. Adrian quickly drew out a towel and the auto-adjusting clothing and gave them to her.

Raphtalia stared for a moment at the clothing which appeared to have scale-like patterns on it but thankfully said nothing. It would be quite awkward to explain that it was literally made from snakeskin though some sort of odd magical process. Still, the black coloured shirt and pant were a fairly elegant design and had some of the best defensive stats he could offer.

She quickly went to get herself cleaned up and Adrian politely looked away as she stripped and jumped into the shallow river. Though he kept _Blindsight _active. Security was ultimately more important than privacy.

Adrian found himself contemplating the Legendary Sword. There were some aspects that made some sense, killing monsters allowed him to take _something _from them to empower himself, that was experience. And if he absorbed them then he could take more and unlock specific functions in his sword which were called skills and stat boosts and even use this ephemeral _something _to boost his weapons.

Truthfully most of his weapon enhancement methods were based on the same idea. Absorb something and then use it for empowerment in slightly different ways. The only exception seemed to be proficiency which was oddly unrelated to the other system, sure it complemented them but it was very different.

He needed to figure out the underlying logic here or he was never going to figure out if there were more enhancement methods. Logic said yes. Glass had her own weapons from another world, there were the Seven Star Heroes here, assuming one or more method per weapon that was at least eight more possible upgrade methods. Wait...nine more methods, L'arc existed as well, and Glass' world might have even more heroes than that.

Adrian needed those methods. He had experimented a bit after speaking to Agatha but so far all he had managed to figure out was that he could use a filter function to see which swords had what type of stat boost and skills as equip bonuses. That's it. All his attempts at finding a power-up method had failed.

One obvious tactic was to ask the Seven Star Heroes but he needed a lot more leverage for that. The only other choice was experimenting whenever he had a free moment but that was more or less shooting in the dark hoping to hit a target that may or may not even exist.

Adrian considered the situation for a moment and decided that he would spend fifteen minutes each day just trying out random methods. It was likely to be useless but the benefits of even one method were just too potentially useful to dismiss.

Raphtalia came running back to him. Her hair was still a bit wet so he drew out another towel and dried it out.

"We'll have to cut your hair child," he said, studying her tangled locks. It looked surprisingly good for a child who probably had not been able to take care of it for weeks but was quite messy none-the-less.

"Yes, ," she said, her voice quiet but calm. Her fear had eased, though he would not pretend to understand why. He absorbed the soiled clothing and towels, noting that absorbing the hair had unlocked a second version of the companion series before he picked her up again and headed back.

Once again it barely took an instant, and thankfully no monsters were nearby. He kept the Filolial eggs and Raphtalia down. Quickly finished off the meal and gave Raphtalia a fairly generous portion. Easily twice as big as his.

She didn't question it or say a word, just looked to him for permission. A nod and she was ravaging the food with abandon. How odd that this messy eater looked so at peace at this moment. He didn't understand this child, surrounded by a forest full of monsters with a man she didn't know, she should not have been so calm.

Was she hiding it well? Or was it that she was lowering her guard thanks to the paltry kindness that he had shown her. He would have to be careful to ensure that she wasn't as careless in the future. This world was not a kind place.

" ," he heard her voice hesitantly.

He looked at her both through Blindsight and his eyes and was shocked for a moment. He had yet to eat even half of his meal. She was done with hers.

Adrian shook it off," Do you need more Raphtalia?" he asked, carefully studying her expression for truth.

"No," she said, shaking her head, there didn't seem to be any sign of dishonesty so he nodded.

"Good." he said, " we shall be resting here for an hour or so. The eggs are going to hatch in that time," assuming that the timer on his status screen was true.

"Are we going back to the forest after that?" she asked, her fear returning.

Adrian winced but nodded slowly, "I'm afraid so. I need to level up the Filolials a little bit. But I promise Raphtalia there won't be an incident like what happened with the Dragon again."

It was a hasty promise that he was not sure he would be able to keep but it seemed to comfort the child.

How pathetic he was. Lying to children for his own self-satisfaction.

"Get some rest," he suggested, before drawing out the carrier from before. Raphtalia nodded the fatigue obvious but then she looked to him, he tilted his head, curious as to what she had to say before she just ran towards the carrier and moved into it.

He absorbed the tables, chairs and other utensils and sat on the ground, deciding that he would meditate. He needed the calm and it would be nice to get back into the habit of it again, he had missed it over the past few days of madness after practising it constantly for years.

Adrian kept _Blindsight _active but allowed himself to relax as he slowly controlled his breathing. He noted that Raphtalia wasn't sleeping she was just lying down but ignored it. It was understandable.

Instead, he focused on his breath and his status system. It was about time that he began to unravel it.

His attempts failed but time passed and soon it was time for the eggs to hatch. He got up and picked up the eggs and placed it in front of himself. He found himself oddly excited by the event, it was like waiting for a lottery.

Adrian felt an odd combination of grief and amusement spike as he sensed Raphtalia trying to see the hatching while not moving from the carrier.

"Raphtalia," he said, trying to keep his voice light," I know that you're awake, you're free to watch this if you want to."

For a moment she didn't move but then she got up a slightly embarrassed smile on her face. But her excitement didn't diminish as she ran towards him, almost fell down but caught herself, and then crashed down next to him before sitting on her knees in a display of flexibility that only children could perform.

He found himself smiling as she stared eagerly at the eggs.

_**0:0:24**_

A few more seconds and he could see the eggs shaking. It was a little surprising that they were both hatching at literally the same time but he suspected that was due to the Monster Seal rather than natural coincidence.

Raphtalia looked on with a smile responding to every twitch of the eggs. It was not long before cracks swept across the surface and the two filolials burst out.

And he did mean burst, the egg fragments went flying everywhere as the Black Filolial bounced out of his little prison. The white one was more sedate but fragments still went flying.

"Guee!" proclaimed the Black Filolial before jumping straight into his lap.

Adrian was a little surprised but found himself with an armful of the bird. It was surprisingly warm and soft. It looked very different from what he had expected. Adrian had seen newborn chickens, they had been ugly featherless beings with some sort of fluid stuck on them. The Filolials, in contrast, were covered in feathers and looked adorable.

Adrian stroked the one in his lap for a moment before the other one walked up to him as well and pecked at his knee. He laughed at the look of envy on its' face before picking it up as well. Then he paused to consider just how he had managed to read the facial expressions of a _bird_.

"They're so cute." he heard Raphtalia say in a whisper. She was staring at the birds.

"Would you like to hold one of them?" he offered, almost without thought, thankfully the Black Filolial played along and walked towards her in response to his words. It seemed they understood English as well. Clearly these things were super birds, he could not afford to underestimate them.

She hesitated for a moment but an insistent peck from the Black Filolial had her smiling before she picked it up and gave it a hug and for the first time, he saw a glimpse of the girl who must have existed before the waves struck her home and initiated the utter destruction of her life.


	14. Chapter 14

Adrian carefully made note of the monsters within range of his Blindsight. There were nearly four hundred and fifty of them, most were nothing special and the remainder would take nothing more than a moment of focus. He double-checked anyway and found that his initial analysis was correct.

He spent a single instant verifying that his charges were alright and found them eating their snacks. The filolials had proven to need more than their body weight in food since their levelling had started and Raphtalia had a significant appetite as well. Thankfully his sword allowed him to supply food to them with little difficulty and currently they had more than enough food with them on the floating wooden disk.

Adrian then used Dash to move both upwards and forwards. In a fraction of a second, he had reached the ideal position to strike down his targets and he activated his _Glide_ skill that seemed to allow him to control his movement through the air. It was not flight, more of a controlled fall really, but it was enough to stay in his favoured position for a second or two.

That was more than enough for him to use his enhanced perception to track down and decide exactly how to strike his targets. Adrian held up his weapon and intoned," Thousand Swords."

Immediately ten ethereal blades glowing the same blue of the gemstone embedded in his sword manifested around him. Each of the ten then split into another ten swords, which in turn split again. In less than a second, he was surrounded by a thousand shining blades. Adrian commanded them to hunt down the targets he had decided for them and they obeyed.

Adrian had not bothered to consider things like obstacles or distance. His blades were fast enough and had enough power to pierce through hundreds of obstacles and still have enough power to kill their targets and considering that he had an average of two and a half blades per target he was certain that at least 90% of them would die.

It took the slaughter five seconds to be completed and a moment to check on the results with Blindsight confirmed Adrian's estimates. Most of his targets were indeed dead, for the rest, he said, "Change Sword. Explosive Sword."

In an instant massive explosion rang through the forest as the swords near or _inside _his targets suddenly ruptured. There were a few survivors of even this.

Adrian quickly checked on the filolials and Raphtalia. It had been less than ten seconds since he had left their vicinity but Raphtalia already looked a little scared. Adrian ignored her fear for the moment. It was cruel but he needed them to be levelled up as much as possible. So he repeated his previous series of skills.

Blindsight to target, Dash and Glide to travel to an optimum location and then Thousand Swords to kill them. It consumed nearly 5% of his SP to perform this combination of skills despite the SP mitigation Status Enchantment but the massive amount of experience and the limited time that he spent away from his dependants made it the best possible tactic.

Adrian repeated this combination thrice, the result was that a massive area in the shape of a circle centred around Raphtalia and the filolials was completely cleared of monsters and that he had boosted their levels by a fair extent. Adrian himself was only at level 36 despite killing more than a thousand monsters but his filolials were at level 15 and Raphtalia was at level 22.

That should be enough for them to grow up to adulthood even if he stopped hunting here and now as long as he supplied them enough food. Of course he wasn't done yet, he would probably have to spend the next two hours or so harvesting the monsters he had killed but he would be able to take the wooden disk with him ensuring the safety of his party and giving the filolials a chance to grow up enough that in the worst case they would be more capable of defending themselves.

Already their stats were incredible and were rising each time he bothered to check on them. It would seem that their biological development altered their stats, Blindsight allowed him to confirm that they were growing fast enough to be easily observed and their stats were increasing by three or four points per second. Right now their stats were around a tenth of the werewolf but it would only be a matter of hours before they were able to match him.

Still, they were levelling faster than he had anticipated and worse his growth was slower than he had anticipated. It would seem that he would have to leave Dragon territory without hitting level 50, still that only meant that he would need to target some aquatic monsters - he would need them to find the hourglass in Cal Mira and class up his party.

He shrugged off his contemplation. That was something to worry about later, for now, he should focus on harvesting these monsters. He had no intention of ignoring such an easy source of power.

Adrian used Dash to appear in front of his party members. The two Filolials chirped at him in greeting but dived back into their food without waiting for a response. Raphtalia was far more relieved and though she said nothing and continued to nibble on her food, he could see that she had relaxed after his arrival.

No doubt she was glad that she had her defence against this forest in close range.

Adrian focused on the projections that were embedded in the wooden carrier disk and started moving towards the closest monster. He hoped that he got some sort of skill to make his harvesting easier it was quite annoying to spend mere minutes to kill thousands and then spend hours butchering them.

*************************************************************************************  
Harvesting monsters was tedious above all. The gains from dismantling and absorbing them were substantial he had gained more than ten times the stat gain in comparison to his level up from 35 to 36 but the reality of it was that it was dull and disgusting. Thankfully Adrian had a really fascinating process to observe.

The accelerated growth of his filolials.

Raphtalia and his filolials were changing right before his eyes but while in Raphtalia's case the growth was relatively slow with her only gaining a few centimetres in height until now despite being a higher level than the filolials for the two birds it was a far swifter and more significant change. Adrian had to confess he truly adored Blindsight. It allowed him to glimpse the true magnitude of the changes that the filolials were undergoing.

Some aspects of their growth could be considered to be obvious. They were getting bigger and heavier but those changes were eclipsed by the internal changes. A larger nervous system whose size was doubling every ten or fifteen minutes, denser muscles, larger bones, more numerous internal organs...the list went on and on. It was honestly terrifying and underscored why they needed to eat so much, their body mass was literally doubling every half an hour.

Already they looked more like swans rather than their initial ball-shaped body and he could see that their torso, limbs and neck were elongating with every passing moment. Adrian had assumed that it would take at least till midday to see their fully grown form but it was clear that it would take no more than another three hours at most.

Even more amazing was just how rapidly their stats were increasing. They were doubling every few minutes. Already they were nearly a fifth of the stats of that werewolf on average and in case of the White Filolial her MP stat was more than half of the werewolf's one. The Black Filolial, in contrast, had fairly high stats but they were even across the board.

It seemed that one was specialized in magic while the other was a generalist with a minor focus on defence. It was an interesting stat distribution and one that made him a little suspicious.

A defensive generalist and a magic-user for the backline was exactly what he wanted. It would round up his party like no other combination. It was simply too perfect. Plus Adrain remembered Filo from the light novel, she was pretty much a pure attacking agent, which was perfect for Naofumi. It made him wonder if the Legendary Weapons had altered the filolials so that they fit the hero.

Still, it was nothing to complain about per se but it did underscore just how little he knew about his primary weapon. The Legendary Sword was his only real asset for the moment. Hopefully in time, the Filolials would aid him, but for now, every single one of his plans was dependant on the sword. It was unnerving to realize that the most critical aspects of his plans were dependant upon a tool that he had such little understanding off.

Adrian finished absorbing his latest target and ignored the notifications on the swords once he had confirmed that it was just another attack stat boost. He focused on the wooden disc and began to move again.

To his surprise, the White Filolial stopped eating and jumped off the disc before starting to walk next to him. Adrian looked at her and asked," Is there something wrong?"

He checked to see that there was plenty of food left and found that she had left her pile of food half-eaten. What did she need?

"Guee," she said before tapping his hand with her beak and then pushing her head against it.

Adrian blinked in surprise before realizing that she wanted head pats. He ended up giving into he demands, feeling an odd sense of amusement at her clear happiness after he began to pet her. He had never had a pet before but it was good to see that she enjoyed his company. Perhaps it was a side effect of the monster seal and the imprinting process that ensured her trust and affection. Or maybe it was just that he had given her food.

Of course, the Black Filolial was not just going to let it be and so he jumped off the disc and then chirped at him as well before staring at the hand that was not petting the other filolial. Adrian sighed and stopped petting the white filolial and said, "I apologize but this is not the time. I need to finish harvesting the monsters, I shall play with you both after we make camp okay?"

Adrian was treated to a loud 'guee' of protest from the black filolial though it folded after the other filolial nodded and returned to the disc. It still grumbled and stared at him with pleading eyes.

Adrian sighed at the ridiculous sight of a goddam bird making puppy dog eyes at him. It was annoyingly adorable, "I promise to play with you later, okay?" he said and the bird nodded before going back to his food.

Adrian was a little annoyed but mostly he was impressed by their incredible intelligence. They were barely a few hours old and they already understood his language perfectly. It was a little stunning and Adrian was starting to wonder just how intelligent the average filolial really was. How much of their intelligence was his sword and how much was normal for a filolial?

Forget filolials. How smart was the average monster? Was he killing sentient beings?

Adrian shook it off. Even if he was, there was little choice in the matter, this world was kill or be killed. If he wanted to survive the waves, survive Fitoria and survive the humans he needed power.

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	15. Chapter 15

Adrian woke up and immediately flared his _Blindsight_. He took a good long look at his surroundings and only relaxed once he verified that there were no monsters in the area, Raphtaia and his filolials were safe and uninjured and that there was no threat that was likely to manifest in the next minute.

He was still a little concerned about some sort of long-range monitoring by the Kingdom but that was a problem for later.

It was only after this that he noted exactly what his three party members were doing. They had started a game with some wooden sticks in a pile of cloth. Raphtalia was using her hands to catch and throw the ball while the filolials were kicking it around. Adrian wondered just how he had missed this, sure it wasn't harmful but had he truly been so tired as to ignore the sound and just sleep?

Still, he couldn't say that this was a bad thing. It was good that Raphtalia could even consider playing around a little bit, though he was starting to become certain that she was doing her best to just live in the moment and avoid thinking about her past or the uncertain future. It was not a bad survival tactic but he would need to be careful about her mental health.

Adrian considered the situation for the moment, it was about eight in the morning, which meant that he had slept for more than six hours, a rarity since he had been forced into this world. All the same, it was clear that his party members had just started to play around and that once he showed them that he was awake then they would probably stop, or at least Raphtalia would.

That decided it. He would allow them more time to play while he tested out some ideas he had for enhancement methods. He had noted just how odd the proficiency was and how it was a little odd that it only really applied to the sword as a whole while the monster part enchantment had multiple applications.

Adrian kept his eyes closed and carefully regulated his breathing, he did his best to take deeper and deeper breaths and slowly found himself reaching a state of calm. It was wonderful to be able to relax, the sounds of the forest, of the children playing and even the occasional breeze all, felt quite nice now that he wasn't just looking out for threats.

But he disciplined himself, he would allow some time for a relaxing meditation later, for now, he needed to be aware of the environment, _Blindsight _would serve for that purpose, and try out some of his ideas.

It took him several minutes of trial and error to conclude that he could not access anything new with respect to boosting his stats using the proficiency nor did he appear to have any ability to gain levels by using monster parts or by using a proficiency like system. Adrian wasn't sure if this was simply due to insufficient belief in the methods he was considering or if there was some assumption he was making with respect to the method or even some type of condition he needed to fulfil in order to access the method but he failed time and again. It was quite annoying but not unexpected. The chances of him stumbling across an enhancement method barely a few hours after his first attempt were pretty low anyway.

Adrian decided that it had been long enough opened his eyes and stood up. Immediately the game stopped and the black filolial cheerfully dived at him as a greeting. Adrian moved out of the way, very grateful for his speed stat. The filolial was absolutely massive in comparison to yesterday and probably weighed more than he did now. It was nearly as tall as he was and had a far denser bone and muscle structure than most humans, the Filolials inability to fly made a lot of sense now, though he wasn't certain if he really should consider biology an obstacle in this absurd world. After all, he had seen monsters that casually violated the square-cube law and even thermodynamics with their ridiculous size and heat generation.

The filolial went barreling past him and nearly slammed into the tree that he had been leaning against. It looked at him with wide eyes and Adrian started to feel bad at the betrayed look it was giving him until reason asserted itself and Adrian remembered that the bird's stats were probably high enough to do some serious damage if Adrian was careless. It may have only been level 20 but its' stats were quite high for such a low level.

Adrian wanted to admonish him but then realized that he really should name the two of them, it was rather rude of him not to do so actually, especially after they had demonstrated that they were quite intelligent moment after their birth...he also had two names in mind, though he wondered how appropriate they would be.

He decided to simply ask them about it later once they could talk. While it was rude not to name them immediately, this was a rather unique situation where he could ask a newborn about their opinions on their own names, an exception would have to be made.

Still, that didn't stop the Black filolial from preparing to pounce on his again.

"Don't," he warned, and felt a little bad as the bird wilted, it was hard to remember that this bird was barely a few hours old when he was this large.

He walked up to him and stroked his head getting a chirp of contentment," I am not durable enough to have you jump on me okay? Please don't do that again." he said, and then sighed when he found that the bird was ignoring him. Though he pecked Adrian's had insistently when he stopped petting him.

Adrian sighed and continued doing so even as he turned towards the other two people in their camp, "Good morning to both of you." he said, "how are you feeling? Any problems regarding your growth spurts?"

Adrian could tell that they were fine, his _First Aid _and _Diagnosis_ skills told him that they were fine, but these skills only gave him a clinical interpretation of their health. It told him precisely nothing about their emotional wellbeing or how they felt about their growth.

The white filolial gave him a shake of her head that he was able to tell was a negative and then bounded over to him, he gave her a smile and began to pet her as well. The fact that these birds fully understood what he was saying and had an emotional spectrum that was as broad as humans still stunned him. It felt very odd that they were so human. How was it that a species that had to be biologically different was so very similar to humans in their manner of thought?

Raphtalia just shook her head and said, "I'm okay ," but he could tell that she was a little confused.

Adrian stopped petting the birds and walked towards the centre of the camp, he absorbed the plates and the scraps of food that were lying around and released the new plates from his sword that were clean and then placed some fresh food on them. Each plate was full to the maximum that he could stuff on them with some fairly fragrant hot food and the two filolials didn't wait for a moment before starting to eat. Raphtalia was more hesitant but as Adrian sat down and patted the ground next to him, she quickly jumped in place and pulled the plate towards herself.

She looked to him again before taking a bite but Adrian just smiled and said, "Eat child. You'll need the food to fuel your growth."

She looked a little confused again but shook it off quickly and began to consume her share quickly. Raphtalia was nothing compared to the messy and ridiculously quick speed of the filolials but she was eating quite swiftly nonetheless. She must have been very hungry.

Adrian took a moment to note that Raphtalia had not grown as much as he had expected. Barely a few centimetres taller and a slightly more developed body with her muscles and fat layers building up a bit. Then again her growth was only slow compared to the filolials, if compared to any other situation then she had probably aged by months during the past twelve or so hours.

Adrian shook it off. He would study their growth later. For now, he considered his plans for the day. He needed to get his party to level 30 by the end of the day and hopefully he could move past the thirties today, four levels in a day were probably too much to expect but hopefully, a full day of hunting in dragon territory would be enough to ensure at least that much.

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Adrian had managed to reconfigure his status menu to show him a graphical representation of his experience gain with respect to time. It was fascinating to realize that he was actually increasing his experience gain exponentially with time and that he was genuinely getting better at slaughtering monsters.

It was just too bad that the exp requirement for levelling up was growing even faster. In the past six hours Adrian had killed more than 3500 monsters, he was still harvesting them all, but despite his massively increased kill rate, he was still only level 38. At this rate, he would need to kill at least 50,000 monsters on par with the ones he had killed today just to get to level 50 and Adrian highly doubted that he could manage to find that many monsters in the next few days.

The only good part was that while his level growth had slowed to a crawl his stat growth thanks to mastering weapon forms had increased. So his stats were probably good enough to match a level 70 with ease at this point despite his own pathetic level. It was a bit of comfort but despite the fact that he had surpassed that level 75 werewolf he felt quite unsafe. After all, a rogue hero like himself would not be targeted by just one or two weaklings, if he was a target they would likely send an army after him.

"Guee?" came the sound of the Black Filolial as it looked down at him inquiringly. It must have noticed that Adrian had finished harvesting the body of the dragon.

"Yes, I'm done for now," he said, feeling a little better just speaking to the bird, "We can have our break."

"Guee!" the Filolial King exclaimed with joy before bounding back to the wooden disk that carried the food and starting with the meal. But before it could really get into it, the massive bird used its' wing to indicate that he should come over.

Adrian felt a surge of gratitude towards him. It was quite out of character for the glutton to be concerned about anything when food was in front of him but he just shook his head and waved his hand. The massive pile of food on the disk was meant to be for the Filolials alone.

Adrian then turned his attention to the white filolial who was letting Raphtalia get off her back before she walked towards the food and began to eat as well. Adrian walked towards the girl who was looking around a bit awkwardly.

"Raphtalia, I wanted to speak to you about something important," he said,while leading her to an area where the smell of the beast he had just harvested was not as strong and drawing out a table and chair combination from his sword "It is regarding what you wish to do with your future."

She sat down and he followed, she started to say something but then hesitated before starting again, "My future?"

Adrian was glad that she was willing to ask rather than just stay silent and nod, "Yes child. You are a free young lady and that means that your future is your choice. I will do my best to help you with information, money or any other resources or training that you might need, but in the end, the choice must be yours."

Raphtalia looked overwhelmed, "Umm, I-I don't understand "

Adrian smiled ruefully, feeling a little annoyed with himself, this was a conversation he was handling quite poorly, "Raphtalia I want you to think about what you wish to do in the future. You have a great many possibilities. If you desire to look for a family member of yours, then I'll do my best to track them down. If your goal is to become a crafter then I'll try to arrange an apprenticeship and pay for it and so on." he said, trying to explain, "I'm not asking you to figure out an answer right away but I'd like for you to start thinking about it. Okay?" he asked, trying to keep his voice as gentle as possible.

She nodded rapidly," Y-yes." she said, but he could tell that she had not fully assimilated what he had asked of her.

He smiled nonetheless, "Very well child but please remember that you are always free to ask me questions about this matter and any other and that I will help you no matter your goal. Just take your time and think about it."

Raphtalia swallowed and then spoke up hesitantly, "Don't you want me to fight?"

Adrian frowned, considering her for a long moment during which Raphtalia face seemed to show greater and greater fear, he answered "No child I don't. I am levelling you up just to ensure that you are as safe as possible and to make sure that you have more options available later on. A higher level has few drawbacks."

She nodded, the relief on her face was heartbreaking.

Had she really been so worried about this possibility? It was sickening to realize just how little he understood this child. She must have been terrified of the possibility that he would throw her in battle as soon as he levelled her enough.

Adrian promised that he would do better. He needed to be better if he was to raise this child right. He may not have thought it wise to aid her but in the end, he had chosen to help her, it would be pathetic of him not to treat her to the best of his ability.


	16. Chapter 16 (Raphtalia POV)

**Raphtalia POV**

Raphtalia was surprised to realize that she was starting to get used to the monsters. was really, really strong and he killed a lot of monsters very quickly but then he went to each one of them, butchered them like Sadeena used to cut up her prey and then used his sword to absorb them.

In the beginning, they had scared her, most of the monsters were bigger than the filolials were and they all looked really, really scary and smelled bad whenever cut them open. She had shivered whenever she had seen them and she had worried about one of them getting up and hurting her.

It took thousands of monsters for her to figure out that was much scarier than them. He barely took five minutes to kill thousands of them and then spent a long time cutting them to pieces and he didn't stop. Raphtalia was tired despite the fact that she had been sitting on one of the Filolials for most of the day, so he must have been super tired but he was just killing them again and again.

Right now he was cutting up a _huge _dragon whose head was bigger than was, but she could easily see the massive wounds on its body and the large pool of blue blood that surrounded it. The setting sun made it a little difficult to see but it was still obvious that it was dead. Raphtalia had seen the glowing blue swords that was using right now to cut the monster into smaller pieces flying into the air a few minutes before they had reached the dragon. No doubt they must have killed it.

She felt a little bad for it, it must have just been sitting around here when a huge swarm of swords came down from the sky and killed it. It must have been really scared.

The black filolial she was riding on started to walk towards . The man was still cutting into the belly of the massive monster, and he made a quick slash with the small knife he was using. Immediately a huge set of gashes opened up and a horrible smell spread around the area. Raphtalia quickly pinched her nose shut with one hand while gripping the feathers of the filolial more tightly with the other.

"Guee?" asked the bird.

"No food for now," said , his eyes straying towards the large wooden disk that the filolials had been eating from "you have just eaten. Wait for a few minutes before I give you a refill."

The bird continued to plead with him but stayed firm until he finished harvesting the dragon. Once he was done though he called the disk to himself and held the knife over it, the shiny blue gemstone lit up for a second before a huge amount of hot, tasty smelling meat appeared on it.

"Enjoy," he said nodding at the filolials, who immediately jumped into action and began to eat. Raphtalia giggled a little when she saw that even the White Filolial who had been standing aloof was eagerly eating.

She had noticed that though both filolials looked very similar except for their colour, the way they acted was very different. They were both really cute though and they were always hungry, Raphtalia hadn't realized that filolials needed _so _much food. Though it might have been because they were special filolials.

"Raphtalia," said , turning his attention towards her, "would you like to eat now as well?"

She shook her head quickly and he nodded before starting to walk again. She held on tightly as her ride began to move. The filolial was just following the disc and was really not paying any attention to where he was going. She hoped that he didn't crash into something.

They took a long time to just walk around, going from monster to monster before called for them to stop. By then the sun had set and she was feeling really tired and a little sore. The black filolial was comfortable and his feathers were really soft but sitting in the same place was making her legs hurt.

led them to a clearing and then said, "All right. We'll camp out here for a few hours. There's a river over there," he said pointing," it has no monsters. Get yourselves cleaned up while I set up dinner."

He handed Raphtalia some towels and another pair of clothing and said," Raphtalia wear clean clothes but make sure to bring back what you're wearing."

She was about to say yes but the filolials started to move before she could.

"Guee!" stated the filolials before they both went running. Raphtalia quickly grabbed on tight. She was used to the sudden accelerations by now.

When they reached the river, the filolial bowed down to let her get off and then joined his fellow filolial in the river. Both of them had just jumped in but Raphtalia slowly took off the clothes that had given her, kept them and the new clothes in a dry spot, and then jumped in herself.

The water was a little cold but that just made it better. Raphtalia submerged herself into the water and found it a little odd that it didn't smell like she was used too but then remembered that this water was not like normal water. It wasn't from the sea but it still felt nice. For a moment she relaxed, just letting the water wash away the fatigue.

Then a massive splash of water pushed her towards the river bank.

Raphtalia sputtered as she turned to look at the culprit and found that it was the Black filolial who had thrown water both at her and at the other filolial. Raphtalia grit her teeth in irritation until she turned to see that the splash of water had managed to completely soak the clothes.

She swallowed. had given her those clothes, she knew that they were magical, she had seen them change size after she had worn them and he had said that they had defensive properties. He was going to be so angry that she has spoiled them.

Raphtalia walked out of the river and moved towards them, her worry just spiked again, she had been right. Everything was completely soaked.

"Guee?" came an inquiring sound, Raphtalia almost jumped and turned to see the wet black filolial. How had something that big managed to sneak up on her?

Raphtalia tried not to feel angry at the bird but the clothes in front her just made her rage rise again. It didn't last long. She knew that liked both the birds she had seen him pet them and feed them whenever they wanted, he would be angry at her and then he might take the clothes and the food away and hit her. Then she heard his voice.

"Don't play pranks like that again," he said sternly to the filolial who tried to look small, " something that is funny to you may not be to others. Apologize to Raphtalia."

The bird nodded and then looked towards her and then walked towards her and lifted up the wet clothes in his beak.

Raphtalia felt her anger and worry fade away when whacked the bird upside his head and said, "I didn't mean to give her the clothes you ruined brat."  
Then he turned towards her and then some clothes appeared in his hand with a larger cloth that was thicker, "Wear these Raphtalia," he said and then turned away and looked towards the white filolial who was floating in the river and called her out.

Raphtalia looked at the clothes in her hands and then turned to who had taken out a really big cloth and was drying out the filolials a little after he absorbed the clothes into his knife.

For a moment she felt odd, something was off, then she realized that he wasn't angry at her. He had barely even cared about the clothes.

Was he that rich or...could be a member of the nobility?

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Dinner was amazing. Raphtalia was happily munching on the food that was kept on the table in front of her. Mr Adrian was sitting to her right, while a floating disc was used to hold all the food for the Filolials. The campfire was enough to make sure that there was more than enough light to see.

Mr Adrian had made a lot more food than normal. Instead of it just being some roasted meat, he had made a lot of different types of food and some really tasty bread, all of it hot and ready to eat. Even the water was really cool and clean.

She didn't know what sort of magic he had but it was amazing that he could use his sword to make enough of it for the two filolials to be satisfied. Both the birds were eating a _lot _of food, while she and had eaten two plates worth of food, the birds had eaten even more than them in plates that were at least thrice the size of the one she had eaten in. And they were still eating more.

It was kind of scary how much the two of them ate.

Raphtalia picked up a small piece, broke it up into smaller pieces and ate it. She wasn't really hungry anymore but it tasted really good. She didn't want to waste any of it.

"Adrian!" said a boy's voice, "Can I have some more pleeease?"

Raphtalia looked up from her food quickly, she turned around in her chair but found no one, then she looked at who was looking at the black filolial.

"...so you've gained the ability to speak. Can you transform into your human form?" he asked.

"Yup," said the filolial cheerfully.

Raphtalia stared at the massive bird who was somehow _able to speak._

"What about you?" asked , looking to the other filolial.

She nodded before opening her beak and saying," I can speak as well father." Then she closed her eyes and began to glow.

A pale yellow glow lit up the clearing, making the campfire look like a dim candle before she _changed _and girl her size replaced the giant bird. Raphtalia stared at the pretty young girl with glowing silver hair and wings of the same colour that was standing in the same place that the white filolial had been in.

It was like from mama's story of spirits taking human form. She was pretty and was glowing just like the Princess from that story.

"It's good to see that you both have grown up fully." said , "Would you mind transforming? I need a measurement for your clothes."

"But big bro…" he started only to pause as raised an eyebrow," I want to eat first," he finished more quietly.

"You can eat in your human form," he stated plainly.

"Fine," said the bird, clearly annoyed but he transformed as well, once he was done, he immediately looked at Adrian, his now human form looking at the man intently.

rolled his eyes, drew out some food from his sword and placed it on their plates but before they started eating. He held out two sets of clothes that were more like large cloaks.

"Wear these for now." he said, "I'll get you something better soon."

The white filolial nodded and took the black coloured cloth but the other filolial said, "No need!," and changed back to his filolial form. The massive bird expanding to fill up space, it immediately began eating.

sighed but hung the clothes on the chair he had been sitting on and said," Just wear them later when you transform."

"Okay," the filolial said before continuing to inhale the food.

Raphtalia just stared at the absurd conversation in front of her. She rubbed her eyes and then stared again. For a moment she couldn't believe what she was seeing but the winged girl was still eating her food.  
This was real.

"Surprising isn't it?" said quietly as he sat down at her side again, " Royal Filolials have a powerful ability to transform but it is always amazing to observe something like this."

Royal Filolials. The words rang in her head, so that's why they were so different from normal filolials. They were special and were like Kings and Queens.

Raphtalia had assumed that was special and strong but maybe it was not just him but these two as well. _Was that why they had grown so fast?_

"I'm afraid that their growth is my doing," he said, and Raptalia blinked in surprise when she realized that she had spoken her previous question, "This sword has the power to boost experience gain. It's why you're growing so fast as well."

Raphtalia's eyes widened and she looked at her hands and then at her body. She was going to become like them! Was she going to become huge as well? Or would she be able to transform?

Mr Adrian broke her out of her panic by rubbing her head, "I meant that you shall age faster Raphtalia, nothing more. Please don't worry about it. You've grown a fair amount already, I suspect that you'll be grown fully by the day after at most."

"O-okay," she said, but internally she was stunned, she had been feeling stronger, _better_ but she had not realized that she had been growing up. Mama had told her about the fact that demi-humans grew up quickly if they leveled but she had seen Zach grow up after he started hunting with his father back in the village. He had taken months to grow up a little.

Was using some type of magic on her? She swallowed, looking at her hands again, wondering if he was changing her into something else. He had promised her that she would not fight but maybe he wanted to make her into something else so that she could fight properly. Maybe he was just waiting until she changed fully.

Raphtalia knew that everyone outside her village was dangerous, was _really _scary but she was almost sure that he wouldn't hurt her. She was still scared of fighting but maybe she could fight some of the weaker monsters.

It would be better to fight them. Raphtalia was sure that they would be easier to fight them than to run from .


	17. Chapter 17 (Raphtalia POV)

_**Raphtalia POV  
**_

Raphtalia woke to the smell of an amazing breakfast and was treated to a simple meal of bread with some sort of cream spread over it and roasted meat. It wasn't as luxurious as the food last night but she was quick to eat it.

The filolials received almost exactly what she had but in much greater amounts. Mr Adrian sighed as he watched the mess they were making but didn't say anything until they were done eating.

"Okay both of you need names." he said," do you have any suggestions?"

"Please give us our names father."

"I'm Trystan big bro!" said the Black Filolial.

Adrian raised his eyebrows as the two filolials turned to each other after their statements. Raphtalia saw that he was a little concerned about something but she couldn't pay attention to him anymore because the black filolial-no it was Trystan- had started to argue with the other one.

"Hey, sis! He's our big brother _not _our dad." the young voice that sounded like Keel from the massive bird was still very odd to her.

The other filolial who was in her angel girl form barely looked at him as he flailed his wings around, "Father has raised us so he is our father," she said, and Raphtalia could hear the '_you idiot'_, very clearly.

"But he can't be my big bro _and _your dad! Then he'd be my brother and father, that makes no sense!"

The white filolial agreed, "That is why you should realize that he is your father as well. And _he _should name us, you don't name yourself."

The argument continued and Mr Adrian just watched until the winged girl started to say, "I, the ruler of all power-"

"Enough!" Mr Adrian said, his voice wasn't loud, but Raphtalia shivered at his cold tone. She was happy that he wasn't paying attention to her.

He looked to the angel girl and asked, "Do you think Isis is fine? It refers to a very powerful mythological being from my world and if your skill at magic is as potent as I suspect it is then it should be a good name."

The girl lit up, "Thank you!"

"Good," he said smiling, "but Isis, Trystan please remember that it is fine for you both to argue about your different opinions but please do not become violent or use magic. Okay?" his voice had turned stern towards the end.

"But-" Isis started to say.

"Isis, he is entitled to his own opinion. We are not related by blood, if he feels more comfortable considering me his elder sibling then I'll be honoured about that and if you feel better about considering me to be your father then that is perfectly understandable as well."

"Okay." she said, a lot more subdued, "Sorry."

"It's okay!" said Trystan, "I was angry as well and kind of stupid too," he said sheepishly rubbing the back of his head with his wing.

Raphtalia felt tears prickle out of her eyes and quickly started to wipe them away. For a moment she couldn't figure out _why._ Then she realized what this reminded her off, Keel and Rifana arguing and then her Sadeena resolving the fight.

"Raphtalia?" said Trystan, as the giant bird approached her, "are you okay?"

Raphtalia tried to dry her tears and nodded at his blurry face but his panic only grew.

"Big bro! She's crying-"

"Give her a hug Trystan. It'll make her feel better."

Before she could respond to Mr Adrian or the filolial she was buried in a huge mass of warm feathers as he picked her up.

It was strange but nice. 

"I, the source of all power command you, shatter, bend and _break_," said Isis as she pointed at the ground beneath a small pack of wolves.

Immediately the ground beneath their feet began to vanish in odd segments, it left behind a gaping pit with this spikes present which the wolves were impaled onto. The three survivors howled their fury but didn't approach the girl, warily circling her even as she stood there with a simple combination of a skirt and shirt without even a basic weapon to her name.

Raphtalia found it really amazing that the angelic girl could fight so well. She knew that this was her first battle and though Raphtalia herself and Mr Adrian were a bit concerned she knew that neither of the filolials was worried in the slightest.

Trystan was cheering his sister, a far cry from his annoyance when Mr Adrian had announced that only Isis would be fighting this pack, he didn't look worried at all that his sister was fighting. They were both really brave.

Mr Adrian was worrying a lot though, enough to compensate for himself and both of the filolials combined, he had five floating swords moving around him mid air and was holding onto a sword in his hand tightly enough that his knuckles turned white. He really did act like their papa, always worried, but willing to let them play anyway.

Isis jumped out of the way of their attack, the jump took her really high into the air and then she started to fall, but she flared her wings and almost came to a standstill before starting to chant again. Raphtalia didn't hear what she said properly, the howling of the wolves prevented that, but she saw the massive fireball that was created easily enough.

It crashes into the ground with a huge amount of force, sending up dust and a wash of heat she could feel from the distance she was at. Two of the wolves were _melted _by it, their flesh sloughing off their bones like it was wax.

Raphtalia winced at the horrible smell and pinched her nose shut. The last remaining wolf tried to run away but Isis ran up to it with her glowing fist and slammed into its back with a huge amount of force.

The wolf was _bent _around the point where Isis had hit him and made one last wretched sound before it collapsed and stopped moving.

Isis skipped back to Mr Adrian, looking like she had gone for a short walk if it wasn't for the blood splatter on her dress and the incredible devastation right behind her. She stopped in front of him and waited while he considered the scene.

"You did very well Isis." he said, and patted her head, "how long do you think you can keep up that level of combat?"

"Yeah sis that was awesome! The fireball was amazing, those wolves were nothing"

Isis smiled brightly at the compliments but her look turned serious at the question from Mr Adrian, "I can use the spells for a long time father. It takes me almost no effort to use them...but they are not instantly usable like your ones."

She looked away at that last point as if it was an unbearable shame.

" This was your first real battle Isis," he pointed out, "you did spectacularly and will only improve in time. Don't worry too much about how long it takes you to cast a spell, with your skill and mana reserves, you can make each spell count. That matters more."

She smiled and he turned to the filolial she was riding on, "Alright Trystan it's your turn now. There is an interesting chimaera a which we will encounter in a few minutes in that direction," he said pointing towards the sun, " do your best and remember that your first priority is to _stay safe._ No reckless moves." he slashes his hand as he said this in a warning tone.

Trystan responded seriously for once, the hyperactive filolial only nodded and said," Yes big brother."

Mr Adrian smiled in response, "Thank you for taking it seriously. We'll be there to back you up if needed but do your best."

"Yes!" he said.

As they walked towards the monster Raphtalia began to wonder about Mr Adrian. She didn't understand him at all. He said that he didn't want her to fight but he was leveling her up along with the rest of her party and he was making _them_ fight.

They reached the monster and Raphtalia saw that it was a really big lizard with a huge snout. The monster reacted to them before they got a chance to do anything but Mr Adrian casually swung the sword in his hand and a massive blade made out of wind stopped its' charge and made it wary. It stopped and began to circle them, its large tail whipping back and forth.

"Raphtalia please move off Trystan's back," he said, his tone calm and cold.

She jumped off instantly and then turned towards the filolial, "Good luck." she said, hoping that he would not get hurt against the huge monster. Raphtalia was sure that Mr Adrian would stop it...but he could get hurt anyway.

"Thank you!" he said looking at her, "I'll beat it up real good!"

"Trystan," said Mr Adrian, his tone was urgent, " please start when you're ready. It is getting to charge again."

"Okay!" he said and burst forward.

Raphtalia closed her eyes and held up her hands to block the wind and dust. She had been right next to the filolial when he had runoff. She quickly rubbed her eyes and watched the fight even as she cleaned up the dust that had fallen on top of her.

Unfortunately, there was nothing to see, by the time she had managed to clean her eyes Trystan had slammed against the monster and had quite literally kicked its' head off. She could see the massive head of the monster and the gaping wound in the headless body that was spitting out blood. A massive pool of oddly coloured blood was forming around the body.

"That was risky Trystan." said Mr Adrian while moving towards the corpse and starting to harvest it, "had it been even a little bit faster or had your attack not been enough to kill it you would have been in a rather bad position. Don't be _so _direct in your attack next time okay?"

The filolial laughed sheepishly and said, " it was really weak so I didn't worry too much and just kicked it."

Mr Adrian looked up to him, his head moving quickly to stare directly at the bird, and said, "you can judge their strength without any significant observation?"

"Uh-huh, it's' real easy. I could tell that this one," said Trystan while kicking the head, " was really slow and could bite _really _well, so I hit its' head very hard. I didn't think it would die so easily though. I was getting ready to hit it again," towards the end he was starting to complain.

Mr Adrian looked contemplative and asked Trystan a bunch of other questions but Raphtalia was starting to feel a little numb.

They were all amazing. Isis could use some powerful magic, Trystan was really fast and strong and Mr Adrian could do so many incredible things. The more she thought about it the more she realized that there was nothing she could do that would help him.

Mr Adrian spent all his time fighting so he must have been an adventurer but he could use his magic for food, water and even clothes! He didn't need anything else. Was this why he didn't put the slave crest on her? Was she totally useless to him?

Raphtalia felt a cold certainty rise up at that thought. She _was _useless to him but he had helped her which meant that there must have been something he could take from her. 

They spent the rest of the day like that. Mr Adrian would go up into the sky and kill a lot of monsters but he would always leave a few alive. Then he would make Isis and Trystan fight those monsters while he was harvesting other ones.

None of the monsters were strong enough to trouble them and whenever a lot of monsters came to fight Mr Adrian would kill most of them and then let the filolials fight all the leftovers. It was the first time that Raphtalia had really seen him defeat the monsters when they were close by and she realized why Mr Adrian was able to cut up these huge monsters so easily without getting scared. He was so fast that she couldn't even see him and all his enemies died without a fight, she couldn't even see him move before the monsters ended up dying.

They continued even after the sun had set and Raphtalia had long since lost count of how many monsters they had seen but Mr Adrian and the filolials didn't seem to get tired and they kept on fighting.

Then her stomach started to growl. Raphtalia winced but she was walking right next to Mr Adrian and he had noticed it immediately. He looked at her and then sighed.

" Let's take a small break for dinner," he said, "we've been hunting for hours without much rest."

"Awesome!" said Trystan, "Can we have that dragon meat we had yesterday? It was really tasty."

"Sure," he said amused, "consider it an apology from me for pushing all of you so hard today."

"Yes!" said Trystan, dancing around in place for a bit before they started moving.

He led them to a clearing and then started to get things set up for dinner. Raphtalia started to drool a little as the smell of the food began to spread. She realized that his dinner set up was more elaborate than normal. He was not using his magic to make the food instead he was getting some _almost _cooked food and then preparing it a bit more.

Raphtalia moved a little closer to see what he was doing and so did Trystan, Mr Adrian saw them both and Raphtalia froze until he said, "Curious? I'm using the sword to prepare most of the food but I'm making a few modifications to the recipe."

"Will it taste even better?" asked the black filolial a large strand of drool hanging from his mouth.

"It _should_. You all will be the one to tell me if I succeed, so look forward to it okay?" he said, and then looked to her, "Raphtalia, please take this medicine okay, it should not be needed but it is best to be safe."

He handed her a glass bottle like all the medicine he had given her. She opened it, smelled it and drank it down in a single gulp once she realized that it was the same medicine as before. She waited for the warmth but frowned when she didn't feel anything.

Mr Adrian noticed and he stopped cooking and turned towards her.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, concern clear in his voice.

She shook her head but then stopped, _could something be wrong?_ She didn't know how the medicine worked.

"Umm, the medicine didn't _feel _like before," she said after he raised his eyebrow, she tried not to feel scared about complaining to him after he gave her medicine. His silence as he raised his hand to his chin made her feel even more scared but after nearly a minute he just said.

"It could be the dosage because of your growth Raphtalia," he said, "but it is more likely that you are simply not as injured as before so the feeling was different."

Her eyes widened, that was right! She was much better than before and all the pain was already gone. The warm feeling had been the pain going away but with all of it already gone it didn't do _anything_.

Wait, that must mean that he had wasted the medicine on her!

Raphtalia looked at him but he just patted her head and then went back to cooking. She let out a breath she hadn't realized that she was hadn't realized that the medicine had been a waste.

The next day was a lot of the same but Raphtalia had just realized something. Mr Adrian was as strong as Sadeena had been, if he had been there during the wave then he could have stopped the monsters and saved the village.

But even if he could not do that anymore...he could still save Rifana.

Raphtalia looked at him from where she was sitting on top of the filolial. He was running with the two filolials who were in their Royal forms and they were moving to a new area where Mr Adrian was going to kill the monsters using his magic swords.

She didn't know if he would help. She didn't know what he wanted or when he would make her fight but she knew that he was better than the fat man who had hurt her again and again. Raphtalia should ask him, he was scary but if he would save Rifana then he could do whatever he wanted to her and it would be okay.


	18. Chapter 18

_**Adrian POV**_

Watching Trystan and Isis fight was teaching him a lot about fighting. It shouldn't have been a surprise. Adrian didn't fight, he just butchered his targets. They didn't get a chance to retaliate or to show their tricks or anything like that. All they could do once they were in range was die.

The _Lesser Drakon _that Isis and Trystan were fighting was a perfect example. Adrian had killed half a dozen of them with ease. He had never seen a living one up close, as the simple combination of _Blindsight _and _Thousand Swords_ had been more than enough to kill them along with a few hundred other monsters. The only remarkable part of the monster had been that it had unlocked 14 different sword forms which was much greater than the average of five.

Trystan and Isis however could not simply slaughter them from a few hundred meters away with a single attack. The monster had more than enough defense to survive one of Trystans's kicks or Isis' spells. It couldn't hurt them either, Isis was well defended by Trystan, and the black filolial had enough defense that he could probably stand still and barely be injured.

All in all, it was a wonderful demonstration of what combat between beings who were in range of each other's strengths should look like.

It was probably why Adrian was seriously tempted to eviscerate the _drakon_. Every attack from the drakon that _almost _hit Trystan, or whenever the monster approached Isis while she chanted her next spell tempted him to just _kill_ the thing and be done with it.

It was a foolish impulse. Combat practice was something necessary for them. They didn't have his advantages, Adrian would almost always have the edge in terms of versatility and raw stats, his allies would not. In fact if they faced people like Glass or L'arc, it would be wise to assume that they would be at a huge disadvantage stat-wise.

It didn't stop the heart attack he had every time Trystan was sent flying by an attack. The superhuman nature of the Filolial meant that an attack that would have turned an elephant into a puddle of blood and guts was something that he could just shrug off but it was still heart-stopping to see the bird go flying through the air before he regained his bearings and bounced back into battle.

Only the fact that he could see his filolials life force and the fact that he had access to some pretty miraculous levels of healing let him continue this sort of training.

Raphtalia was not as calm as he was. The girl had become attached to the filolials, Trystan in particular was very fond of her, and she flinched every time they were attacked and watched with tense anticipation no matter how trivial their enemy. Adrian feared that he might have been exacerbating her issues. She had lost her parents to battle, it would not surprise him if she had an immense aversion to it.

She kept on turning towards him, but didn't say anything. Adrian wondered if she was considering asking him to stop making the filolials fight. He knew that she liked them, she probably didn't like to see her friends fighting giant monsters. He kept a portion of his attention on her using _Blindsight_, she was right next to him, but most of his focus and his eyes were on his filolials. He felt bad about exposing her to battle like this, but they had to be his priority for the moment.

Isis was chanting even as she moved away from the monster, Trystan interrupted the snake-like monsters charge by slamming into it feet first, the scales where Trystan hit shattered and the organs and muscles beneath them turned into pulp.

The _Drakon _hissed in fury but backed away from Isis and turned its attention towards Trystan. It tried to bite the black filolial.

That was its' final mistake.

Isis took her chance and finished her long chant. She had an incredibly focused expression and through his _mana sight _he could see that she was collecting an incredible amount of power. She began to glow both in his normal sight and mana sight and he could _feel _the world around him shudder.

An instant later her whole body lit up with a corona of lightning that coalesced into a thin beam that slammed into the _drakon _while it was chasing Trystan.

The results were horrific. The beast died in an instant but its dead body continued to twitch as the lighting ravaged its' muscles, eventually, that stopped but only because its entire nervous system had been utterly ravaged and its muscles were basically vaporized or liquified. The smell was eye-watering and made him feel like throwing up.

But it was _very _effective.

He smiled at the two filolials as they approached him, Raphtalia looked relieved and a little sick, she alternated between staring at the filolials and the still smoking monster behind them. It was interesting to see the combination of awe and fear she held.

"Well done," he said, then turned his full attention towards Trystan, "Trystan I know that you are durable but you must stop taking unnecessary hits."

It had been the only real flaw that his inexperienced eyes had noticed. Thankfully the battle had been slow enough for him to analyze it easily.

The bird looked a little ashamed but nodded seriously enough and said, "Yes brother, I will. I promise."

It was good to see that he was willing to take the battle seriously. It had worried him a great deal to send the cheerful boy into battle. No matter the fact that he was a giant bird, he was still _two days old_. He had been worried about the filolials getting traumatized or not taking the battles seriously enough. Thankfully they took the problem seriously enough.

"Raphtalia," he said, waving his hand towards Trystan.

She nodded and scrambled up on top of Trystan with Isis and they began to move towards their next target. Adrian kept an eye on them with _Blindsight _but took went towards the smoking corpse and began to harvest it. It would not unlock any powers but he wasn't willing to leave it to rot.

Plus, any additional drops would see _some _use later on.

Adrian frowned as he tried to _feel_ the flow. It was better than before, he could tell that _something _was there, but it was like trying to hold onto air. He could feel it but it just...slipped away.

He sighed, closed his eyes, and then tried again. Adrian took a deep breath, focusing on the point on his hand where Isis had inserted her magic, and then did his best to _feel _it.

One breath, as slow as he could make it. A second and then a third. He felt his senses focusing on the feeling of _lightness._ It was hard to describe like there was something crawling underneath his skin, it was odd but it felt good. Like it was making him stronger in some way.

But then the feeling started to fade.

Adrian opened his eyes and looked at Isis who had been waiting while nibbling on some grilled dragon meat, "Again," he said.

She nodded and then touched his forearm. Instantly he felt a spark flare through his body, starting at his arm and then spreading, he nodded and closed his eyes. Trying to remember the _feeling _as best he could.

Another series of deep breaths but this time he felt something more than before. It was like he suddenly had another sense. He tried to _move _this phantom limb but it didn't respond, it was eerie, like deciding to move your fingers only to find that they didn't respond.

Inhale and hold.

He focused all his will onto that pseudo-limb and as he exhaled he _pushed._

"You did it!" came an excited voice.

His concentration shattered in an instant and he felt his control go haywire. The feeling of the limb faded like it had never been there and Adrian felt oddly empty as he opened his eyes and stared at his hands.

They were glowing for a moment. It was a short moment all told but with his stats, it was basically an eternity.

Adrian didn't fight the smile that wanted to emerge. Even Trystan's obnoxious interruption didn't change anything, he had finally started on the path to be able to do _magic._

He looked towards the young lady who was the only reason he had gotten as far as he had, "Thank you Isis." he said, " I owe you one."

And he meant it. Isis did what she did intuitively, without any real thought behind the matter, that was impressive but it meant that this method she invented and Adrian modified was something she had worked hard to figure out.

Isis smiled brightly and immediately stopped berating her brother.

Adrian stared at the results of his late-night hunt with annoyance. His efficiency had risen yet again. He had gained more experience than ever before but in every other measure, he had gained less than before.

Fewer levels, less than two hundred new sword forms and practically no useful skills. All in all the Dragon Territory was proving to be a location with diminishing returns. He had not expected to reach this point after just two days but it was clear that he had overestimated the variety of monsters in this area. If his suspicions were right then it must have been because of the Dragons destroying all the other monsters in the area, cutting down on the species diversity.

The plants were still pretty varied but most of them had started to give him stat boosts after he had unlocked a lot of plant growth boosts, plant alchemy, poisons, herbology related swords and such. He had no problem with the stat boosts of course but the simple fact was that it was becoming more and more difficult to make a profit hunting here.

Considering that his party was at level 38 with Raphtalia a little lower at 35, it would probably be wise to head towards the coast. He needed to hunt down some aquatic monsters beyond the freshwater monsters he had hunted, some more swimming and underwater combat skills would be good to track down the hourglass at Cal Mira and hunt down some unique monsters underwater where he was likely to find a lot of interesting monsters.

Adrian sighed, annoyed, at how badly he had overestimated the usefulness of this area. He had assumed that just because it was rumoured to be full of powerful monsters he would have a good chance of reaching level 50 swiftly. Yet, here he was at level 43, barely able to level up _once _despite leveling solo for _four hours._ It was a horribly slow rate in comparison to his previous achievements. To be certain it probably exceeded anyone else on the planet but considering that he was going to fight an apocalypse for certain and potentially nations who wanted to control him while protecting three young children that he had dragged into this mess...well he had good reason to rush.

Adrian blinked in slight surprise as the camp he had set up for the filolials and Rapthalia came into view. They were talking, no, it was more like Isis and Trystan were teaming up against Raphtalia.

He stopped and tried to understand what they were saying, _Blindsight _didn't help here as he couldn't read lips and even if he could Trystan was in his filolial form _and _Raphtalia and Isis were not speaking English, but he could tell that Raphtalia was not feeling cornered.

The hug from Trystan confirmed his suspicions but also bought up the question of what they were talking about that Raphtalia seemed to be on the edge of crying. She was smiling and wasn't _sad_ but she was unquestionably worried about something and the other two were comforting her.

Adrian smiled a little at their kindness, their trust in each other, tentative as it was, and crushed the swell of melancholy that threatened to swamp him.

He waited until they had calmed down and then used _Dash _to get close to the camp. He ensured that his footsteps were loud enough for them all to hear them. Demi-human and monster ears were more than good enough to casually hear his footsteps and _Blindsight _let him catch the scramble to prevent him from realizing what they had been doing.

He kept his smile up as he walked into camp, sat down near them, but far enough for them to feel comfortable, warped his sword into a smaller form and then looked to the three of them.

They still looked a little tense but the filolials had already started to relax. Raphtalia, however, looked even more worried than she had before. He would need to start this conversation, or at least allow her the opportunity to speak with him if she wanted to.

"Did something happen?" he asked, keeping his voice light, palms facing his party. With Raphtalia's growth she was much taller than him when he was seated so it would likely help her consider him as a little less intimidating...though the slaughter of thousands of monsters and the smell of blood as a result of that probably didn't help matters there.

All three of them exchanged looks before Isis looked away. Trystan, on the other hand, pushed Raphtalia forward with a wing and said, "Raphtalia wanted to say something to you big bro! You have to help her!"

Adrian sighed, a little frustrated, at Trystan's horrible explanation. Even worse Raphtalia looked at Trystan with betrayal in her eyes. This would probably not end well but he had to wonder about what _help _she needed.

Oh, he could imagine a fair share of problems but none of them _should _be something he could help with. Her parents were dead, village ravaged and she had been enslaved and tortured. Wait-did she want revenge? That was something he could manage fairly easily. He had a name, after all, he doubted if it would take more than a week to track the man down. Normally he would be a little creeped out by the idea of killing a man...but killing the piece of trash who had given her those scars would be an honour. Adrain still remembered the bruising, the cuts and the internal bleeding that he had seen through _Blindsight_. Anyone who did that to a _child_ deserved to die slowly.

Raphtalia looked at him, uncertain, but determination won over her fears and she rushed out her sentence, "Please save Rifana from the fat man!"

Adrian blinked, looking to Trystan and Isis for a little help, he could guess whom she meant by the Fat Man, that must have been the slave trader or perhaps Rabier, if the man was fat but who the hell was Rifana. Adrian remembered a Keel who had been in Rabier's basement but Adrian had figured that the child would not be there right now given that he had been found in the cell after about two months or so. No child would survive for two months in Rabier's _care._

Trystan, unfortunately, interpreted his look as a sceptical one, "Big brother you _have _to help!" Even Isis was nodding in support.

Adrian sighed and said, "I'll need a more detailed explanation."

He looked at Raphtalia's terrified face, "Raphtalia, please tell me exactly what you are talking about. If it is in my power to help I'll do my best okay?"

It was reckless to make a promise like that. He had no idea what had happened to the girl...but he could guess. There was only so much that the light novel could cover. It was entirely possible that there were far more children who had been tortured alongside Raphtalia.

The thought made his fury rise and Raphtalia's rambling explanation of her friend being beaten every single day after the 'fat man' bought them stoked it to an explosive extent.

Once she was done there was only once answer that he could give no matter how badly this disrupted his plans.

"We'll try to help her. I promise," he said, his voice cold, Adrian paid no mind to his tone. He needed more information. He saw Raphtalia smile at his words but ignored it for the moment. It would be cruel but he would not give her false hope.

"But," he continued, and watched her wither, " it will be difficult. We need to track her down, take out that man before he can trigger the seal or use her as a hostage and ensure that none of his supporters can track us down."

He wasn't telling her the main problems but he suspected that she knew it. She just didn't care to think about it.

"That's fine." said the ten-year-old in a teenaged body, her tone determined and for once it was without any fear.

She bowed deeply, "Thank you ." she said, and when she raised her head it was with a smile. There was no joy in it but it seemed that she was content.

It was a shame that it was all too likely that the girl would be dead long before they got there. Still, as the three children went to sleep and he took the first watch he opened up his Cartographers Sword and accessed the _Map _skill.

It didn't show him _exactly _where Idol had his territory but it was easy enough to guess where the Demi-human dominated locations were given that he knew where the Seatto region was. They would have to travel there and then refine their directions.

It grated on him to abandon his plans for Cal Mira but it seemed that he was far less pragmatic that he wanted to be. Risking his future for a slight chance of saving a little girl.

How pathetic that he was actually _satisfied _with this course of action. He was far too sentimental and in this world, it could very well get him killed.

****It was truly fascinating to see the night sky with his sensory enhancements. To any human back in his world the difference between night and day was obvious, even with the advent of electricity, the darkness could never be chased away entirely but with his Infrared and Ultraviolet Vision-based powers the night was just as bright as day. It honestly didn't look like what the movies portrayed, it was that he could simply see and describe a lot more colours than normal and Adrian loved it.****

With _Blindsight _to watch over the area to ensure his safety he could relax a little while meditating and experimenting with his new skills. He had unlocked a fair number of them and while he was aware of the ones which were useful in direct combat this was the first chance he had gotten to test out some of the more subtle powers. It was truly remarkable just how versatile the Sword was, he had considered it before, but it was clear that this thing was _not _meant to be used in battle. Or at least its' primary function was not combat. He had gained more than ten times as many crafting, sensory or miscellaneous skills like Plant Modification or Analysis than he had combat powers and that spoke louder than the words in a light novel.****

He needed to figure out what the actual purpose of the Legendary Heroes actually was, fighting the waves was probably just one aspect of the job but given the abilities, it granted it was very, very unlikely that it was the only one. It was quite unfortunate that his best source of information was probably Fitoria and he had precisely _zero _intention of seeking her out, no matter that raising Isis and Trystan would earn him some points with her.****

He sighed and ran his hand through his hair as he stood up on the large wooden platform and stretched a little. He balanced himself carefully and made sure that his actions weren't _too _abrupt, the wooden carrier was a lot better desgined than his pathetic initial designs and had more than ten projected swords being used to move it but they were nearly five hundred meters in the air and while Adrian was certain that he could use Dash to easily get them all to the ground safely it would be a very rude wake up call if the disk toppled, especially since the three of them had _just _fallen asleep no more than an hour ago.****

Isis and Trystan were both quite tired after running for a few hours. The two filolials had been the first two parts of his plan for moving to Rabier's domain as fast as possible. First, it had been Isis in her Filolial form who had carried him, Raphtalia and Trystan, in his human form. Then Trystan had swapped with her and carried them and now it was Adrian's turn to use the carrier to transport them. It wasn't anywhere near his top speed but it was an effective system to transport the group as a whole. Ideally, they could just keep on moving continuously but Adrian was certain that they would need to take a break sooner or later.****

Adrian turned his attention to Raphtalia as she started to stir, the child had not been able to rest very well since she had made her request to save her friend and since Isis and Trystan had fallen asleep first, coiled up with each other, Raphtalia, for once, wasn't snuggled up with Trystan in his filolial form. It seemed that her nightmares had returned because of that. He sighed and sat down next to her, the layers of cloth and cushion making it quite comfortable, and began to stroke her head, making sure not to touch her ears. It took some time but she began to calm down.****

He flared _Blindsight, _expanding the range by feeding it a bit of SP and Magic Power, he hadn't expected much, a monster that was targeting them or one that he might have to be a little careful for at most, which was why when he saw a group of three _apparently non-existing things _fighting a _Drakon _he almost stood up.****

Adrian carefully ran through his sensory suite, his carrier almost stopping before he set it to moving a _bit _slower, he didn't want to warn anyone but found that _none _of his skills could actually find anything odd about the scenario. Normally, that would mean that he would have considered it okay and checked other places but with the _Drakon _moving in an attack pattern, the soil being dislodged and trees and the ground getting cracked open by both the Drakon and its opposition...well his skills telling him that _nothing _was there just made him more suspicious.****

He swallowed the thrill of fear as the distortions, which he remembered having detected _right after _he left the capital, killed the _Drakon _with some difficultly. It seemed that while he could not spot them he could find the drops of blood the spilt after an injury. He had no information on them but one thing was certain. They were after him and they had chosen to hide their presence. They were his enemies.****

The only question was if they had reported back to their masters and if so what their masters were doing.****

Adrian shook his head and kept his carrier moving, carefully trying not to move faster or slower than before. They were a threat but they were not a threat at this exact instant. Hell, given how long it had taken them to kill the Drakon, Trystan and Isis could probably kill them all but that was never the danger of spies. Adrian needed to interrogate them, he needed to know what they had sent off about him _and _who they served.****

Then he needed to kill them before they got reinforcements. If he was lucky they would have not sent their reports in yet. Though he doubted that fact. Adrian felt his fear and anger rise, no one from Melromarc would be happy about their pet Hero slipping off the leash and then ally with Demi-humans and monsters, Adrian was fairly certain that they would kill him but he doubted that they would be so kind with his children.****

His determination crystallized and his mind turned to plan. They needed to be introogated and killed, their masters determined and hunted down it was the only path forward.****

Adrian looked at the accursed Sword that was leashing him to this world and said, " You had better be good enough,"****

He wasn't sure if the glow on the gem was acquiescence or an insult.**  
**

****

Waking up three young children after they had spend hours working hard was difficult. Waking them up to tell them that you wanted them to move away from battle so that retreat was easier was _much _harder, espcially when they _wanted _to help.****

Well, Raphtalia didn't seem to _want _to help but it seemed that she felt obligated to do so.****

**"**Isis," he explained with a sigh, " we don't have much time for this. We've gained a small lead on them because they are injured and tired but that won't last. Please listen to me I'm doing to _so _that I can retreat more easily. It will keep me safer than any other option."****

For once Isis looked like the child she was, her face was scrunched up and she looked to be on the brink of tears, " ...At least let me help you! I won't get in the way and Trystan can take Raphtalia to safety."****

Trystan looked mutinous at her words but didn't say anything. It was remarkable just how easy it was to read the boy in his human form. Raphtalia looked back and forth, nor saying anything, looking scared and worried. He felt like a monster for making these children worry and it underscored his previous thoughts, he had dragged them into his orbit and potentially ruined their lives. His frown and fury deepened as he realized that if these spies had already made their reports then none of them would ever be safe, his plan of letting Raphtalia live life free from the chaos would be impossible.****

Adrian hesitated but had to admit that while she wasn't as strong as him she _should _be able to take on their enemies with ease, plus he could carry her while using _Dash_, it was far from impossible. In fact, Adrian could see a few advantages, she was his magic expert, or at least as close to it as anyone in his party could get to.****

Yet, she was still young, lacked his advantages and hadn't even classed up yet. Stat boosts from the monster and filolial series or not she was not experienced and she was still less than a _week _old. He didn't want to have her witness torture and execution.****

Adrian snorted at his foolish thoughts. Wasn't he the man who was asking them to kill monsters for him? To fight an _apocalypse _for him? Hadn't he raised them, _named _them with the expectation that they would be powerful enough to match Fitoria who was basically a _God _in her own right?****

He looked at her eyes and made his decision.****

**"**Thank you Isis" he said, kneeling and giving her a hug.****

_Blindsight _let him know that she was smiling. He was glad to see that she had relaxed but realizing just how _small _she was just solidified his decision.

****Adrian felt a small sense of satisfaction as his party members left the range of his _Blindsight._He knew that Isis was still angry with him but she was willing to obey even if she didn't agree. He would have to make it up to the girl, she had only wanted to help him.****

That satisfaction faded as he considered what he was about to do. Adrian was going to cripple, enslave, interrogate and then kill three people. No matter how he sugercoated it or justified it; that was a simple fact. It made him feel a little sick to realize just how far he was willing to go for the sake of his survival and that of the people he cared for but at the same time, the logical part of him couldn't help but conclude that this was _inevitable. _After all, in this world, he was a high profile entity he could _not _avoid taking decisions that would alter the lives of many. Hell, even his decision to focus on going home above all could very well get _millions _killed, in such a place in his situation being unwilling to kill would be a massive handicap. A weakness he could not afford.****

In this case, if he didn't get rid of these spies then it would place him at an unbearable level of risk. The thoughts of getting his throat slit in the night when he was resting or leaving his party behind to train and return to find their corpses and a trap kept flashing in his mind, a grim reminder of _why _he had to kill these people.****

So, Adrian prepared. He had made sure to keep the distortions moving after them, forcing them to expend stamina and then he had _boosted _the speed of his carrier leaving them in the dust before slowing it down later. He had taken to the skies, moving nearly five kilometres up in the air before going back down _behind _the distortions after he had slowed down the carrier ensuring that he had gotten to see their maximum speed. They didn't speak to each other nor did they stop but he could tell that they were getting slower. Still, they were determined to track him. It made his path forward quite clear. These people would _not _give up and given that they had not spoken a word to him, negotiations were unlikely to succeed.****

For now all he could do was wait. He was nearly a kilometre in the air, using Glide and Dash to stay in position. His normal low-quality clothing replaced with the best of his Drop Items and he had his tactics and sword forms at the ready. Adrian had nearly twenty of each type of potion and medicine and was ready for anything from poison to fire blasts. He was as well preapred as he could be.****

It did nothing to stop the rapid beating of his heart. The fear kept his mind sharp and constantly tempted him to simply _blast _these bastards into oblivion. If a mere Drakon could actually hurt them then he could kill them with ease, he _knew _that and yet he was feeling hesitant about this whole thing.****

It was necessary but Adrian still felt a little sick while thinking about his plan. He hated the fact that _if _everything went right then at the end of it he would be a torturer, a killer and a slaver. It made his fury towards the scum in this world feel a little hollow if he was willing to go this far just because it was pragmatic.****

Then they entered the range of his _Blindsight, _a flare of power, and he confirmed what he already knew about them. Another moment and he inhaled a deep breath, taking in the cold air of the sky around him. Once he exhaled he closed his eyes and let _Blindsight _track them until they were within optimum range.****

Another breath and he pushed away his doubts. For better or for worse, this was his best option.****

**"**Thousand Swords," he muttered, feeling the SP drain as he forced the creation of hundreds of ethereal blades, making them drop rapidly. Less than a tenth of their number started to move towards his targets. The rest simply scattered themselves uniformly around their projected location.****

As Adrian used _Dash _to move from his position he pulled out an SP potion and drank it. It was a bit of overkill but he would prefer having 100% at his disposal.****

To the credit of his hunters, they did their best to scatter and dodge the projectiles. It wasn't their fault that they were simply too slow to manage even that. The distortions managed to destroy three or four swords each but there were dozens targeting them and eventually, they were pinned down.****

Well, two of them were pinned, the last had actually managed to set up a pink coloured barrier that looked like it was made out of fire. It had actually managed to destroy his attack. Though it had felt a little...off. Adrian had gotten a feeling like rather than blocking his sword it had instead _attacked _the construct instead. Tricky. It was a good solution to his high attack power. Adrian felt his respect for his enemies rise.****

He discarded the idea of taking them _all _alive. One would do. They were more skilled than he had anticipated.****

A thought from him and fifteen Sword Projections emerged from around him. Another moment and the closest swords embedded in the ground around the distortions began to change form. Adrian smiled as he whispered, " Change Sword. _Explosive Sword. Lighting Sword. Wind burst Sword…."_****

Every single weapon that could be used as an elemental explosive slowly started to emerge and Adrian started to feel his confidence rise.****

Then, he saw the people behind the distortion for the first time as they suddenly became visible to his eyes, though _not _to his skills, and felt shock pass through him as he realized that they were all rabbit beastmen.****

Each of the three targets began to glow pale pink as if the flames were beginning to consume them, just as the explosions started. He could tell that only the man who had survived his first attack unscathed had managed to fully power up the defence. Which had to be why while he managed to block the entire series of explosions. The other two died instantly. The massive series of elemental explosions utterly ravaging their bodies.****

He managed to see them via _Blindsight _and his other senses for the first time and it shocked him just how _intact _their body was. Their defences had failed to save their lives but Adrian knew just how powerful he was right now, the fact that their bodies _weren't _torn to shreds meant that either their defence stat _or _their ability could boost their defence to absurd levels.****

Adrian completely dismissed any plans of keeping any of them alive at this point. Their demi-human nature, skills and equipment were unique enough that he was certain that they were _not _from any faction in Melromarc. Siltvelt felt like the most likely option but he would have to leave them be for now. Adrian had no intention of fighting people who likely had managed to replicate some of the functions of the Legendary Shield while holding back when he was this weak.****

If they survived his attacks he would consider interrogation but he would not hold back intentionally anymore.****

The demi-human who had survived was still a distortion to his _Blindsight _but Adrian could see him quite clearly with his eyes. The rabbit man was well built and very well armoured. It was a surprise to see such heavy armour on what he had assumed to be a spy, perhaps this one was meant to be the one who would take part in combat, maybe the visual blocker had failed because one of the others was the caster. Adrian focused his _Blindsight _on a smaller area, hoping to pick up even the smallest movements.****

The rabbit man tried to move, but that just gave Adrian an opening as the man had dropped his pink aura to do so, Adrian didn't wait or hesitate. Five massive sword beams, each at near full power and fairly large diameter cut through the forest. It utterly annihilated a tree that had been in the way but when it slammed into the man it was like the beam was being...negated at the point of contact with the pink flame-like aura. The parts of the beam that didn't hit him went on to slam into the ground and cut through soil and the underlying bedrock with ease. Adrian kept up the attack for four seconds and while that was enough to dig a hole nearly a hundred meters deep behind the man, it didn't do a thing to him.****

No, wait, Adrian could see that his armour was cracked. Not badly, nowhere _near _the damage it should have taken but enough to confirm that his attacks weren't being negated completely. Highly resistant but not invincible.****

A potent combination of fear and determination flared within his body. This man was no assassin. He was a warrior. You _don't _send out solo warriors with such absurd skills out to spy on an enemy unless you want to kill him urgently and this is your only choice. Adrian couldn't imagine why a man with enough defence to actually _tank _his attack would come here without back up and it made him rather nervous. What if these three were only a Vanguard or a scouting force? Or if their invisibility and sensory resistance were _particularly_problematic?****

Had he sent his party to their deaths? Or was he surrounded and wasn't even aware of it?****

His thoughts vanished as he saw the rabbit man struggle to his feet and then stumble. Adrian felt his eyes narrowing. A trap? Or was it genuine? He forced the thought away and launched another attack. This time he used _all _of his projections, narrowed the beams and then Dashed away.****

Adrian smiled as he saw the man buckle, his armour began to melt, as even the resisted attack managed to penetrate enough to start doing damage. Then he blinked as most of the man became visible in _Blindsight_. Adrian focused for a moment and then noted that _every _point except for where the beams were striking him was visible.****

It was a little puzzling but he had his suspicions. So he changed his Sword form and prepared to use a massive fire blast. If his guess was right then the man had concentrated his defences to survive the attack, it seemed that it was these same defences that had blocked his perception skills.****

Of course, this was when he caught sight of Trystan running onto the battlefield Isis on his back, chanting with a huge concentration of wind in her hands. Worse Raphtalia was there as well, holding on for dear life as Trystan ran as quickly as possible.****

Adrian immediately unleashed his attack and then projected ten swords around him. When Adrian and Trystan were about five hundred meters from the fight he blasted the rabbit man who was immediately torn apart.****

The firestorm was immense and he heard the rabbit scream. It was horrifying and the man must have been in agony. The beams that he had set up before and the new ones then worked together as the demi-humans focus slipped. Adrian winced when he realized that he had not left even a trace of his enemy.****

It was almost shocking how easily his attacks had annihilated his enemy. Adrian frowned as he realized that the man's defences were _pathetic._The only thing in his favour had been the pink barrier and once he had begun to crack _that, _Adrian's victory had been inevitable.****

He sighed once he realized that he had badly _overestimated _his enemy. Then he turned towards the two filolials and felt an increasing amount of anger. These two idiots had interrupted a potentially dangerous situation. They could have gotten killed if the enemy was stronger.****

**"**Isis, Trystan." he said, feeling an odd combination of fury and relief as he saw that they were okay, " What _exactly _are you two doing here?"****

It was very satisfying to see the two filolials flinch.****

"It was me!" said the only other living person in the clearing, " I wanted to come and help," she admitted, fear on her face but determination in her tone.****

Adrian just stared at the three children who had chosen to risk battle for his sake and shook his head. He tried to ignore the feeling of warmth rising within him, that was foolish emotion, these three had been absolute idiots.****

He sighed as he dismissed the various swords around the battlefield, feeling their presence slip from the back of his mind, though he kept _Blindsight_up.****

" Let's keep moving." he said, trying to decide what he should tell these brats, and how much of the fault was his own, " but don't think that you've gotten out of this."**  
**


	19. Chapter 19

_**Andrea**_

Andrea ran her hand through her damp hair and tried to calm her mind. She was feeling quite frustrated with her gains today. Despite training for the whole day in the mountains, she had barely managed to gain enough exp to get to a tenth of the amount she needed to level up. She almost wanted to laugh at herself it had only taken her four days to grow attached to Adrian's absurd growth boost.

The thought soured her mood further. Almost anything that reminded her about the Sword Hero caused both fury and frustration to rise up in her mind. Fury at Adrian, Bellamy and Malty with most of it going towards the fanatic and the princess and frustration at _not _recognizing just how badly Adrian was degenerating.

He had run away without warning. Even worse he had run away and gotten a lead of nearly two whole days before anyone had even thought it odd. Andrea herself was quite guilty of this, after returning from the forest she had returned home, taken a bath, given a verbal report to father and then slept for _hours_ only waking up at noon. It had been amazing.

After that, she had practised her swordplay for a bit to get used to her new stats and then had eaten lunch before heading for her meeting with Adrian at six. A meeting which he didn't show for even after she waited for an hour. At the time she had just been irritated, when she asked her father to check on his location and he told her that none of his sources knew _anything _about where he had gone her irritation had morphed into horror. The final confirmation had come soon after that when he had not shown up in front of the inn where they had been supposed to meet.

Malty had cursed him and blamed him, Bellamy had accused both her and Malty of doing something to the Hero and had promised to make them face justice if they had harmed the Hero and she had simply left once she had realized _exactly _what Adrian had done.

Of course, then Malty had proven all of Adrian's fears justified. The bitch had accused him of rape and used the sob story to join the Spear Hero. It really infuriated her, for all that she was angry at him for leaving it seemed to be the _right _move but there was no way to know if the princess would have done that without him leaving.

He had been _furious/frustrated/scared_ and he had taken the simplest route to avoid those emotions. Adrian had left them behind. It grated on her that she hadn't _predicted _what he had done. Had it been anyone else feeling such potent volatile emotions she would have assumed that they were going to instinctively react with either violence or, as Adrian had done, they would flee from the sources of their fear. The only reason she had not realized what he had planned to do was because she had assumed that someone as powerful as a Hero would _not _run. She had spoken to him assuming that he would have lashed out badly at Bellamy, Malty or herself if his frustration built up. Running was not something she had assumed he would do when she had sensed his distaste for retreating.

He had completely ruined her plans to fight the waves. Even worse he had totally ruined her father's plans to keep the other nations at bay after the King and the Pope had summoned all four heroes.

Andrea shook off her thoughts as she stood in front of the door to her father's study. It was a fairly simple door with a carving of a dragon on it, but she ignored the familiar image and focused her senses on the pair behind the door and winced. Both Agatha and her father were drowned in a potent combination of _fear/frustration. That _would not be good.

She knocked on the door nonetheless, waited for an instant for her father to disable the magical security, and then entered.

"Agatha, father," she greeted, bowing.

"Andrea," said the witch tiredly before taking a puff from her pipe. She said nothing more.

Her father didn't speak at all just nodding before waving his hand at a seat opposite his desk. Andrea sat down and then he slid a paper across the desk. It had two paragraphs of information inked on it in neat handwriting. Andrea picked it up and then met her father's eyes. He just indicated the document and so she started reading.

Once she was done she read it again just to be sure. Then she carefully put it down, the edges of the paper were crumbled.

" Damn," she said, her voice was quiet but it echoed in the silence of the room. The only sound being the powder in Agatha's pipe crackling slightly.

Andrea tried to think of the consequence of Melromarc losing _two _heroes after summoning all four and felt her mind go numb. This was _really, really _bad. The world declaring war on Melromarc bad.

" Is this confirmed?" she asked, it was a needless question her father would not have shown it to her unless it was but she had to try.

He nodded and said in his gravelly voice, " As real as can be kid."

Andrea closed her eyes and just shut her senses for a moment. The Bow Hero's entire party had been found dead and the shadows sent to monitor him had been killed as well. No one knew if it was the Bow Hero who had done it or if someone else had killed the others and kidnapped the Bow Hero.

Adrian had vanished without warning. The Bow Hero was gone one way or the other. Andrea sighed and opened her eyes and her empathic sense.

" Are they still alive?" she asked, Andrea knew that her father had contacts with the Four Heroes Church back in Faubrey. Those people could tell if the Heroes were alive or dead.

"Checked in with them today morning. All four heroes are alive," he said, but his emotions and tone gave away the fact that he was hardly comforted by this.

Andrea wasn't surprised, she wasn't either, it was better than the worst-case but there was a long line between alive and okay. And no one knew _where _the Bow Hero fell on that line. The most optimistic interpretation was that the Bow Hero had killed the shadows and his party but given that he had only been at level 19 last she had heard she doubted that he could take down shadows.

Andrea felt a small amount of worry for Adrian. Until now she had assumed that he had left of his own volition but there was a chance that he might have been kidnapped. Then again it was pretty unlikely, she had seen how ridiculous the Sword Hero was.

Still, it didn't hurt to ask, " Any update on the Sword Hero? "

He just shook his head, " Nothing. I've worked with Mirellia's spies to coordinate our search and get some information from the Church. No one knows where he is or even when he left the city."

Andrea winced at her father's _frustration/rage._ But realized just how bad the situation was if he worked with that woman. War must have been even closer than she had assumed, she couldn't imagine any other situation where Mirellia and her father would work together.

Agatha cackled here, her emotions shifting to _Amusement/approval_, "You won't find that boy unless he wants to be found. He hated this city and was smart enough to leave it as soon as possible."

Her father narrowed his eyes here and said, " Explain Agatha."

The old witch raised her eyebrows and casually took another puff of her pipe, " Hasn't Andrea told you about my meeting with the boy?"

"She has," he said, his impatience rising.

" Then you know that the boy was unhappy here." she said, leaning back into the sofa she was sitting on, " why in hell would the boy waste his time in this country? That boy was a conscript who saw a way out and took it."

For a moment Andrea felt almost nothing from her father then a combination of _frustration/irritation/fear _manifested. The intensity was startling.

" I hadn't realized that it was _this _bad, " he said and turned to her, " Is this true?"

Andrea frowned, she had told her father about this before, " Yes, Father. Like I'd said he was very frustrated, scared and quite furious. Bellamy and Malty just kept on making it worse and pretty much everything he encountered in the city was making it _worse._" she said, then paused, " well except for meeting Agatha, he enjoyed that."

Edgar gripped the edge of the table, the fragile wood gave away in the face of a level 90 fighter and crumbled, he dusted his hands and got up. He walked the length of the room and Andrea winced at both his emotions and actions. Father was _really _frustrated if he had started to pace.

Agatha took another puff before father calmed down and sat again, his emotions still simmering below the surface.

He spoke with a tone that showed his frustration, " Mirellia managed to get the vultures to back off by threatening them with the Heroes _and _promised that envoys would be permitted to meet them."

He didn't expand further but Andrea felt Agatha's emotions shifting to _horror/fear _which mirrored her own.

No Sword Hero, no Bow Hero and a hidden Shield Hero. If they let this play out like this Melromarc would be gone by the end of the month _if _they were lucky.

" Can't you get Ethan to bring the Shield Hero back to the capital for a bit? Meet the envoys from Siltvelt and Shieldfreeden at least," she asked.

Her father considered the idea before shaking his head, " No kiddo. Biscas has too much power here. If that man decides to cut his losses he might decide to kill Naofumi and use that to inflame his supporters. Best let Ethan take care of the lad."

Andrea winced at the image that the words provoked. A dead Shield Hero on Melromarc's soil would basically be begging for Siltvelt and Shieldfreeden to invade. A dead Shield Hero _after _they had summoned all four heroes was asking the whole _world _to invade.

" Then let them meet him at Lord Reinchott's domain," she suggested.

Both her father and Agatha considered that neither of them liked the idea of potentially losing three of the heroes but in the end, her father nodded, " I'll speak to Mirellia and get her watchers on the boy to direct some of Siltvelt's agents to him."

Andrea could tell that it was grudging. Both because it had to depend on the Queen _and _because they were being forced to give up on a hero but truthfully she didn't see what other option they had. Even if the only other hero was in the hands of the Royal Family. Andrea had to wonder just how much of this was within Queen Mirellia's plan.

This whole situation was a disaster and it was only going to get worse. Especially after the Church and Adrian heard about Malty's accusation against the Sword Hero. That woman had basically guaranteed that he would be Melromarc enemy. 


	20. Chapter 20

No two cities were the same. It was a lesson he had learned from his world and it seemed to apply in this one as well. Certainly, the basic features like the fact that there would be some form of shelter, some method to obtain food, someplace for people to gather, a market of some kind and many others were inevitable but the history of these features determined a great deal about a city or in this case, a town.

Mildea was a fairly large town. It was at the centre of several farming villages and its' purpose was to act as a trade centre. Its' walls weren't very tall because all the nearby regions that were dangerous had been stripped clean of monsters and the Adventurers guild had a standing contract to protect the roads. The guards out in front charged a small amount of silver to enter but didn't keep track of _who _entered because they wanted to keep the thriving black market active. All in all, it was a very active town which had a fair amount of wealth flowing through it.

Thus it was a real surprise to learn that 90% of the people here were Demi-humans_._

Adrian didn't find it impressive. Compared to New York, Dubai or London this place was nothing more than a collection of hovels. The options present in the market were limited even if the magical goods were fascinating. The filth and squalor that large portions of the population lived in were disgusting. Slavery didn't seem to be a concern here but there were other ills born when an imperfect sentient species gathered in large numbers. Trystan and Isis found the place quite irritating as well. Though in their case it was because he had forced them to stay in their human forms and hide their wings behind some heavy cloaks. Raphtalia was also a little antsy but that was because they were delaying their attempt to save her friend.

Unfortunately, this was his last chance to visit civilization. If all went according to plan after this they would go to Rabier's domain, assault the man, rescue the people he had enslaved, then go to Cal Mira and eventually back to the wilds. So he needed to confirm the location of the Lord's domain and gather some resources that his Sword could not provide.

Food, water, clothing, temporary shelter and even some luxuries like soap were things that his power could provide as long as it had the right materials. The problem was that the Sword had no way to teach him, Raphtalia or Trystan magic nor could it check their affinities. Yet, it was entirely possible that it would be able to do so in the future. Another concern was getting some magic thread for clothing his filolials so that transforming would become a little more convenient. He had already checked that he could use his sword to make the clothes but he needed the thread.

The four of them had visited a Smith first and then a herbalist. Adrian had sold many things that his Sword had crafted. Turned out that medicine, stamina potions and weapons sell _very _well when an apocalypse has started and ravaged a nearby area. Adrian made _ten gold coins _in total which was double the value that he had been given by the King. It made him realize just how paltry the amount the King had given them truly had been.

Their final destination for the day was a fairly small magic shop. Both the Herbalist and the smith had recommended it and while they could be misleading them. it was unlikely to lead to anything very negative so he had decided to follow the advice they had given him. Though this time he would have Raphtalia take the lead. This town had a fair amount of discrimination against humans. The Smith had been much more polite towards Raphtalia though the Herbalist had been fairly apathetic. Thankfully they hadn't desired to throw him out.

Then again he was a masked man with a fairly large build wearing a heavy cloak while Raphtalia was a beautiful young woman. That probably played an even greater role in this case.

Once they reached the store, he double-checked their surroundings and the store with _Blindsight, Mana sight _and the rest of his sensory suite. The crowd made it difficult for him to be certain that there were no dangers. It was fairly unlikely that there were any threats here. But Adrian didn't feel very confident in his ability to pick up spies or assassins after his recent failure to find them.

He took a deep breath as he turned towards Raphtalia, "Please take the lead. After last time…" he said trailing off.

Raphtalia smiled a little but nodded and said, "Yes Mr Adrian."

"Any concerns?" he asked, to be sure.

"Magic thread, affinity test and grimoires for learning magic and confirming the information we have about the Lord's territories." she said firmly, "I remember."

"Good," he answered and gave her an unmarked map of Melromarc. It was created by his Cartography Skill.

She took the rolled-up map and then walked towards the door. Adrian herded the filolials who had been looking around curiously.

The shop itself was very well organized. Adrian had expected something along the lines of Agatha's atelier which was a study in chaotic organization with everything having a fairly well-defined place but the overall organization having no logic. This store was a hell of a lot better organized. Artefacts in one corner of the second floor, clothing which was enchanted on one side, books and grimoires in the basement and even a comfortable place for the customer to be seated if need be. Honestly, it was impressive and perhaps that was why they had to wait for five minutes before they got to meet a clerk.

"Good afternoon Miss," she said, "Welcome to the Mage's Haven. How may I help you?"

Adrian ignored the fox demihuman and Raphtalia starting up their conversation. He scanned the area both inside and outside the shop with his skills. Trying to ensure that there were no distortions. Adrian knew that it was paranoid but he was hyper-aware of the fact that he had detected those three rabbit demi-humans only due to luck. If they had decided to kill him after the first day while he and his party were sleeping...Adrian shook off the thought and placed his hand on Trystan's shoulder, just making sure that the boy was still here. Isis had wandered over to the artefacts, probably drawn over there due to their powerful magic that even he could sense. He let her, it was something she was very fascinated by and if she broke something they could pay for it or escape, in the worst case.

Once Raphtalia had made what they needed clear to the fox woman she led them to a corner of the second floor where a fairly large crystal ball, about fifty centimetres in diameter, sat on top of a sturdy wooden platform. Adrian could _feel _the mana in it and from the way that Isis was studying the object he was fairly certain that she could as well.

A flare of his sensory skills confirmed that there didn't _seem _to be a trap...but maybe he should try using it first. Just in case.

"Please give me a moment to get it ready," she said with a polite, false smile.

Adrian observed with Mana Sight while Raphtalia reassured the woman that they were willing to wait. It was quite interesting how the mana of the fox _didn't _alter the mana of the orb at all. It just seemed to amplify the mana somehow. It was a bit hard to describe.

"It's ready," she said, looking to Raphtalia. The child in a teenager's body turned to him and Adrain winced a little as she made it clear that he was the leader but he tried to play it off and checked his affinity first. Hopefully, the Kitsune was fooled.

"Please place your hands on the sides and keep it pressed until I remove my hands' sir," she said keeping one hand on the top. Adrian gripped the sides with his fingertips and nodded to her while keeping track of the process with mana sight_._

It was fascinating how the mana of the crystal seemed to be changing until it started to resemble his mana. Each moment allowed for more alteration.

"Does this work by synchronizing to my mana which lets you understand my affinity by checking the crystal?" he ended up asking, deeming the question relatively harmless.

The fox woman blinked in surprise before nodding, "Umm...Yes, sir. That's exactly it. Reading a person is hard since they're living beings so we use the Crystal as an intermediate."

Adrian nodded thoughtfully and moved his hands once she indicated that they were done. The woman looked quite rather impressed when she said, "Your affinity is related to the void element. It is also called Ether or nothingness. You will be skilled at using any type of magic that creates objects from magical energy though elemental magics will be rather difficult for you to use easily. Perfect for a craftsman. I would recommend learning alchemy, enchanting or something like smithing."

Adrian blinked in surprise at the assessment. He had been assuming that much like Naofumi had been told that he was good at support and healing magic he would also have an affinity that was tied to his weapon, something attack or speed-related. This was odd but it emphasized how limited his understanding of the world was.

Raphtalia went next and got what he had expected, Light and Darkness with an affinity for illusions. Trystan was fairly mundane with an affinity towards Support and Healing, which was fitting for a defensive fighter. Isis was a different story.

The silver-haired girl touched the orb after the fox-woman had reset it and instantly he could tell that her case was a little odd. Unlike in all the other three cases, the crystal started to match her mana and then seemed to be oscillating between half a dozen colours. After five minutes of this the fox woman looked up at them, her expression uncertain.

"I'm not...I don't know exactly what this means." she admitted, "It's like she has a _lot _of equal affinities. Fire, Water, Wind, Lightning and Light from what I could tell though there were more."

Isis looked smug and Adrian mussed her hair up a bit, which she smiled at him for, "I suppose that should have been expected," he mused. He had seen her use a lot of different elements barely a day after she had been born and she was clearly some type of Filolial subtype that was specialized in the use of magic.

Raphtalia promised the woman that they would pay her in full and then they moved on to getting the Grimoires while Trystan and Isis started to create the magic thread with their mana. Raphtalia managed to confirm the location of Rabier during this time and it meshed well with what the Smith and Herbalist had told them.

It cost them five gold coins for all their purchases after some haggling. Turns out buying all the beginner and intermediate books for their diverse affinities was damn expensive. A single Gold Coin had been enough for the affinity check and the threads but the books had cost four coins.

As they walked out of the shop Adrian couldn't help but feel like they might have gotten ripped off. Though that was at least partly because he couldn't even read yet. He promised himself that he would make it a point to learn as soon as possible and that he would teach Isis and Trystan. No child of his would-be illiterate.

The party moved toward the edges of town, dodging the dwindling crowds as the sun began to set. All in all, it had taken them nearly three hours to get everything done and the result was an irritated Trystan who was feeling quite cranky after getting his mana drained.

Adrian had absorbed all the books, threads and maps into his item storage so carrying them wasn't a problem but it was undeniable that this deviation had been very time consuming while they were on a time-critical task.

As they approached the location from which he would use Dash to get them over the wall one at a time he spoke to Raphtalia, "I'm sorry about the delay. I hadn't realized how long it would take."

He disliked apologizing but his desire to get access to magic to empower his party and himself could lead to her friend _dying._ A miscalculation or not an apology was the least of what she deserved. Even if Adrian personally believed that it was the best possible move for them given that they would not be able to risk entering any town after assaulting Rabier's domain.

Raphtalia looked surprised but then shook her head, "It was only three hours it's fine."

Adrian looked her in the eye and decided that the truth would be the best, no matter how cruel, and said, "We don't know what condition your friend is in. These three hours could mean everything to her." he sighed here, "I just wanted to have some more options in case my hunters come after us again."

It was the truth and Adrian _hated _the fact that it was the truth. He was scared of those invisible stalkers. They might have been watching him from his very first day here, they were certainly watching him from the moment he had left the city with Raphtalia but he doubted that they had suddenly decided to track him right at that moment. Rather, that was when he had first gotten a hint about them. He didn't know who they served or what their goals were and even now he was torn about his actions regarding them.

They were spies and potential assassins. _That _was something he did not doubt about. If it wasn't for his absurd growth those three would have been good enough to kill him with ease. Had it not been for the absurd strength he had gained in Dragon Territory _he would have died _if he fought them. But did that justify his killing them when all they had done was observe him? It was possible that they would have done _nothing _if he hadn't initiated the conflict.

It was honestly shameful that he was so willing to throw away his morality just because it was _convenient _and because he was scared. His father would have been ashamed of him, no, his father might very well have arrested him, he had committed murder after all. A moment later he felt like laughing at the thought. He was being _really _stupid. Trying to apply the morality of his world to this pathetic, broken world.

She looked at him, almost spoke but hesitated before mustering up her courage and asking, " who were those people? Why were they after you?"

Adrian took a deep breath and said, "Let's get back on the move. It's something I should have told all three of you about before. "

Raphtalia nodded and Isis who had been listening in on their conversation from behind the two of them nodded to herself as well. Trystan was just feeling happy that since they were away from the crowds Adrian had given the boy permission to remove the cloak covering his wings. Honestly, it was a bit of a risk but _Blindsight _confirmed that there was no one around here and Trystan had done very well today. A small reward like this was the least of what he deserved.

Adrian took his party over the short walls using _Dash, _easily getting past the guards who could not even perceive him. The only hitch being that Raphtalia was a little embarrassed about being carried by him now that she was a teenager. But this let them bypass the guards at the gates and all the potential watchers that would be looking into who entered the towns should have a little bit more trouble. It was far from foolproof but he would take any advantage no matter how trivial.

Trystan immediately transformed into his Filolial form and they used him to build up some distance before they switched over to using the wooden carrier disc. It was the same version as the one they had used in the forest but painted a deep blue on the underside and ensuring that the indents for the projected swords covered them completely so that there was no glint of metal or light from a glowing magical sword.

Once they were far away and his _Blindsight _had been used to verify that they were not being followed. Adrian double-checked to ensure that they were moving in the right direction before turning to his party members who were all staring at him curiously. Even Trystan was interested after Isis told him about his conversation with Raphtalia.

"All right before I start we need to get some facts established." he said, "What do you know about the Legendary Heroes or Cardinal Heroes?"

Adrian was pretty sure that Trystan and Isis didn't know anything but after considering all the things that they _did_ know he didn't want to just assume.

In this case, however, they just looked a little confused, Raphtalia, on the other hand, looked stunned.

"You're the Sword Hero," she said, in the tones of a realization.

Isis looked between Raphtalia and Adrian before she said in a slightly irritated tone, "What's a sword hero?"

Adrian smiled at her and started to explain, "There is a phenomenon called the Waves of Calamity. It happens every few centuries and it releases a huge horde of monsters. This happens again and again until they are stopped somehow. The heroes are tools to stop the waves. And there are four Heroes. The Shield, Bow, Spear and of course, the Sword Hero." He changed his sword form as he said his last statement.

Adrian winced internally as he saw Raphtalia shrink as he mentioned the waves but continued, it would be good for the girl if she spoke to him about it, better than suppressing it, "Around ten days ago I was summoned in the capital of this country so that I would fight the waves on their behalf...unfortunately my Summoners were scum who just wanted a pawn. They wanted to use me and that's why I left them behind. I'm guessing that the three people who followed us were spies or assassins."

It was a simplified story but he'd fill them in on the details later.

"You're want to go and fight the waves. That's why you're training," said Raphtalia, looking at him with some kind of awe. The wave of anger that it induced caught him by surprise.

Adrian snorted, "I am training because I'm being _forced _to fight the waves," he said bitterly before even thinking about it. Then he winced, he doubted that's what a girl orphaned by the waves wanted to hear from a bloody Hero but honestly he didn't regret it much. If there was one impression he didn't want her to have it was that he was some type of fucking hero.

Raphtalia looked surprised but it was Trystan who spoke next, "Who's forcing you big brother?" he asked, clearly angry.

Adrian felt his fury diminish at his words and the implicit support, "It's not a particular person just a part of being summoned" he lied, he didn't want them trying to _fight _Fitoria, there was another name for something like that, Suicide by Bird God.

"We'll be fighting these Waves in the future." noted Isis, "are the monsters strong?"

Adrian frowned at the line of questioning, he _had _intended for them to fight but…"It's up to you both if you want to fight Isis. You are not obligated to do _anything _regarding them, I'm the one stuck with it. If you two want to help me there are other ways as well."

He didn't know much about the waves at all. The thought of his children fighting an endless Wave of monsters was genuinely sickening. Adrian didn't know when his thoughts had gone from_I want them to support me in a fight_ to _I don't want to drag them into the frontlines of an apocalypse _but at this point, he didn't want them to fight in a wave even if they were powerful.

"But you'll be fighting," she pointed out, wrecking his ideas with ease, "we'll fight if you fight," she said firmly and Trystan nodded along with her even pounding his hand into the opposite palm.

He sighed and wondered how to convince these two _not _to be idiots...and what he needed to do if they were going to be stubborn. Adrian knew what it was like to wish to protect a parent. He would not deny them their choice even if it made him feel ill to even consider the idea.

"I still don't know much about the wave," he admitted, "once I find out more we can revisit this," given their mutinous looks he was pretty sure that they would not be changing their minds until they faced a wave. Adrian swallowed his fears and decided that they would be prepared enough that their survival was a guarantee.

"I...I know about the waves ," said Raphtalia, she was shaking," My village was destroyed in the previous one."

Adrian looked at Trystan and flicked his head towards Raphtalia who was looking at the cloth covering the floor of the disc rather than their eyes. The filolial got the hint and jumped towards the demi-human and hugged her.

She blinked in surprise but relaxed into it then the whole story poured out of her like the dam holding it back had been shattered.

How she had been playing with her friends when the sky turned red and the monsters started falling from the sky. The bravery her parents had shown in fighting the monsters...until they had been overwhelmed and had sacrificed themselves for her and how she had promised to be happy and help the village until some people destroyed it and she was enslaved.

She was crying almost the whole time and by the time her story ended Trystan was crying with her while Isis was furious. Adrian found himself getting more and more enraged as well even as Raphtalia started to calm down and eventually nodded off cuddling with Trystan and Isis.

The three of them slept, it was nice to see how peaceful they looked, but Adrian felt an uncomfortable weight settling on him, he had not even considered fighting the waves as a priority. Hell, the only reason he was planning for them was to avoid Fitoria or Melromrac coming after him with all their power.

Even with having Raphtalia in his party he had never considered the very real cost that the most powerless part of the population suffered. They had never wronged him...even if they probably wouldn't bother helping him.

As he moved across the sky towards the man who had tortured his charge Adrian started to plan out how he would defeat the waves rather than just survive them for the first time since he had arrived in this world. 


	21. Chapter 21

_**Adrian **_

Adrian stood at the base of the wall carefully observing the guards who were on top of it. It was comforting to see just how careless they were. As far as he could tell there were no more than five guards at the gates and around fifteen or so all around the walls. Most of them were slacking off or chatting with their friends and others were meandering around.

It took him only a moment to use _Dash _to get over the wall and into the city. None of the guards had been looking at the point where he had crossed over and Adrian was quick to vanish into the maze of the poorly designed town that Idol Rabier ruled over. He didn't move to the rooftops, it was possible that one of the guards could see him, instead, he used _Blindsight, Dash _and his speed to navigate the dark, empty streets.

There were a few people around, homeless folk, some prostitutes in the red light area and a few drunken fools but most people were asleep. It was hard to believe that it was only ten at night. It highlighted just how important sunlight was to these people, they lacked the magical lights that the capital had in abundance so they had to stop all or most of their activities at sundown. Adrian used his _Blindsight _to carefully check for guards, adventurers and others who were armed. Taking note of all of them but he found almost no one in town who was awake or alert. There were almost no guards in town, save for a small group in a bar drinking and chatting about something. The adventurers were all clustered around a few spots around town but they were not active.

It seemed that none of the guards were worth being concerned about in town so he would only need to worry about the guards on the walls and at the gate. Adrian took a breath, glanced at his HUD for the time, noted that it had only been five minutes since he had entered the town and then focused his attention on the mansion that was present on a hill overlooking the town. Unlike the town which was quite a dump with _nothing _that marked it as even reasonably impressive, the mansion was quite ornate looking if his telescopic vision was considered accurate.

Adrian moved closer he didn't take the winding route up the hill. Instead, he used _Dash _to move along the steeper side that was covered in trees, making sure to use his sensory skills to ensure that there were no traps until the whole mansion was in the range of his _Blindsight._

Back in the forest, the range of nearly a kilometre was impressive but often required a lot of movement from him to make optimal use of. Inside a city, a kilometre radius meant that he was aware of a fair fraction of the city at any given time. So he was barely halfway up the hill when the whole mansion and the surrounding areas came into clear view.

Instinctively he tracked down the basement and found what he had expected. Three Demi-human children, one of them lying on the ground, barely alive, while the other two were relatively intact with nothing more than a few bruises. He carefully noted their features so that he could show them to Raphtalia later and scanned the rest of the dungeon. Adrian's mood darkened when he saw the rotting corpse of a wolf demi-human. The body had belonged to a child no older than six or perhaps the child had been even younger with a higher level. The sight crystallized his intent and banished his doubts.

Idol Rabier _would _die. Raphtalia would have the right of first refusal but if she refused then he would kill the man, no matter how wrong it felt.

While Adrian and his party had been travelling to Rabier's domain he had been trying to figure out what the hell he had been thinking when he had decided to kill his stalkers. The only conclusion that Adrian had come to after meditating on it was that he _hadn't _considered it. The excuse was paper-thin but even after thinking about it he didn't see any obvious solutions. Speaking to them, trying to run or even leaving them be were not valid options. Sure it was _possible _that they wouldn't kill Adrian and his party but it certainly wasn't _likely_.

Still, his doubts had persisted and it had made him reconsider his judgement. His actions may have been pragmatic but they hadn't been well thought out or moral. In truth, he had even begun to wonder just how he should deal with Rabier. Adrian was pretty sure that they could rescue to children even without letting Rabier know about it.

Now he felt certain that he could not allow the man to live. Not when he would just buy some other children to torture. Plus, the man was a noble there was no one who would be willing and able to hold him accountable and he could be a valuable information source especially as the rosary and shrine indicated that he was a devout follower of the Three Heroes faith.

Adrian carefully studied the target's location, trying to objectively assess the situation and trying _not _to focus on the children and their wounds and scars. The guards were distributed around the mansion. The servants were asleep as was Rabier and there didn't appear to be any sign of a wife or children and as far as Adrian could tell with his _Blindsight _there didn't appear to be any physical traps or barriers.

Adrian used _Dash _to move upwards. A quick use of his _mana sight _to check for magical traps was enough for him to be blinded by the beacon of magic that was the obelisk. Adrian took a deep breath, trying to stay calm as he was suddenly reminded of the_Magical T-rex _that was sealed using that obelisk somehow. His fantasies of blowing up the place using a couple of explosions and Sword Beams died a quick death. He _really _didn't want to risk fighting that thing without Fitoria waiting in the wings.

He shook his head and got back to work, carefully using his _Dash, Blindsight _and _Mana Sight _to move out of sight of guards, check for magical traps around the basement, in the basement and in Rabier's room. Once he was certain that there was nothing worth noting Adrian used his _Dash _again. This time he moved vertically upward for nearly five seconds reaching a height of nearly two kilometres in that time. His ears popped as he stopped _Dash _but his stats blunted the negative effects from his rapid movement.

For a moment he used _Glide _to just slow his fall to a crawl and used his perception enhancement to study the town below him. It was out of range of his _Blindsight _but telescopic vision and his other skills to see in the dark and outside of the normal range of vision allowed him to study that town even if it was shrouded in darkness for most, while he waited for _Dash's _cooldown to end.

Adrian considered the size of the town, his skills and then felt a slight thrill of fear as he realized that he could casually raze the whole town to the ground. _Thousand Swords _twice, _Dash _to reposition and retreat, _Sword Beam _to deal with the hard targets and _Sword Change _to convert the two thousand swords into elemental explosives and the whole town would be levelled. As long as he had an SP potion he could do it in less than a minute and then leave with absolutely no long term drawbacks, even his SP would be fully restored by the potions.

A few powerful adventurers might survive but by the time they reacted Adrian would be long gone. He took a deep breath and used _Dash _again but the idea didn't leave his mind. Adrian wouldn't do something like destroying a town full of innocent people, he _knew _that...but just a few days ago he hadn't imagined that he would or even could kill three people out of fear for what they _might _do.

He shook off his thoughts, he would need to think about this later, as he approached the camp in the nearby forested region. His party were sitting around a small fire at the shore of the lake. Adrian had selected the site because it was easily visible from the air.

He landed a few meters away from them and then noted that it had taken him about fifteen minutes for the whole scouting trip. That fifteen minutes must have felt like an eternity to Raphtalia because the moment he appeared she had gotten up from where she had been leaning against Trystan, who was in his Filolial King form and approached him.

"Was Rifana there?" she asked without preamble, absently brushing off the black feathers from her clothes, Isis and Trystan who had been talking about something walked closer to him as well.

Adrian just activated his illusion sword and carefully thought back to the three children in the basement, the image of the three demi-humans formed in thin air, it didn't have much in the way of colour as _Blindsight _didn't give him that information but the way Raphtalia lit up when she saw the girl who had been lying down was enough to confirm things for him. Rifana was still alive and was apparently a weasel demi-human of some kind.

"That's her," she said, for a moment he thought that she would cry but her expression shifted to absolute determination in an instant, "let's go and get her!"

Adrian nodded, "Let's take a few minutes to plan this Raphtalia," he said, trying to calm the girl down a little, "we don't want to risk giving Rabier the chance to activate her Cursed Seal."

He didn't like saying the words but it cooled her enthusiasm. Cruel but effective. He quickly spoke up, not wanting her to dwell on the words, "Our main goal is to save those three demi-humans and for that, we absolutely need to break the seals. As we've tested I can break the seal from either end," he said, nodding at Isis and Trystan who both winced at the memory of him testing out the _Seal Removal Sword _and the _Curse Seal Sword. _It had taken him a bit of time but the results had been telling.

Adrian could remove a slave seal by either targeting the master or the slave. Using the _Seal Removal Sword_, he could also apply a seal and remove it with ease _and _removing the Seal from the master's end allowed him to remove the seal from _all _the slaves at once. There were however two large drawbacks. The first was time, both swords took nearly thirty seconds of direct contact to work _and _if he broke a slave seal it _warned the master._

This was precisely why he absolutely _needed _to target Rabier first. If he didn't he could easily imagine the man activating the seals and killing the demi-humans that he didn't free first.

Adrian was quick to explain his plan. It was simple and had a fair number of contingencies. Drop-in using the Disc, he would capture and bind Rabier while his party would rescue the slaves and then they would leave. Should things go wrong...well he had a few things he would set up just in case but even if his entire plan and all the contingencies went awry Adrian was quite confident that he could just crush all his opposition without much effort.

Raphtalia was nervous and tense as he bought out his Disc and they moved into the air, the air growing colder as he quickly rose to nearly two kilometres in height. Once they were up in the air he looked at the three members of his team and pulled out a large bag and a few sets of medicine and some healing cream.

Raphtalia was the one he handed the bag full of healing items too. She looked at him questioningly and Adrian felt a bit happy that he had distracted her from her worries, even if it was for a moment.

"Heal them up once I give the signal," he stated, trying to keep his tone calm even as he felt his tension growing, "and be _careful_."

She nodded, "Yes, Mr Adrian. I will," she paused for a moment, "thank you for everything, I-I know that I can't ever repay you for any of this but I'll try. I promise."

Adrian wasn't surprised. Raphtalia was a good person all the way through but she was giving him too much credit.

"I have affected your life a great deal Raphtalia," he stated, "but remember that it didn't cost me much to help you out. A few hours of time, some resources that I had nearly a thousand times more of and perhaps a little bit of emotional support. Judge me in accordance with what I sacrificed to help you, I think you'll find my actions a _lot _less impressive."

Adrian meant it. Kindness was valuable. Altruism was excellent for social animals like humans and given how similar demi-humans seemed to be psychologically, them as well, but his help had been born from guilt. A desire to have an ally who was not likely to betray him and nothing more. Perhaps from the outside, it looked like he was kind but it was nothing of the sort and it pissed him off that she was so grateful for his impulsive, thoughtless actions.

She stared at him for a moment before shaking her head, "No that isn't…" she said, trying to frame an answer to his statement before giving up.

Adrian started to continue before he saw that the walls were approaching rapidly, "We'll talk about this later," he said firmly as he moved the Disc faster, hoping that they would not be spotted, even if all the guards were likely to see was just a small dot.

Raphtalia nodded and held the bag of medicines tightly in her hand. Isis closed her eyes and took a deep breath in an action that was reminiscent of what Adrian himself did to start his meditations while Trystan stood up and got ready to transform into his Filolial form.

It took them less than a minute to reach the mansion and Adrian stood at the edge of the disc before looking back at his party, "Remember the plan and stay calm. I'll move the disc lower once I've confirmed that the situation has not changed and then I'll move it to the basement _after _I place the seal on Rabier. Wait for my signal." he said, his voice calm, almost mechanical, and his party responded with serious nods, even Trystan who was normally the one who worried him most was gratifyingly serious.

"Good," he said with a smile and then jumped off the disc. Time to get this started.

Adrian put his party out of his mind and focused on the rooftop that was his target. He activated _Dash _and once he was in range _Blindsight _told him all he needed to know. Nothing had changed, the plan was still practical.

Immediately he landed on the spot on the roof directly above Rabier's room. A moment to double-check the locations of the soldiers and he started to slowly move the disc closer to the ground, out of the line of sight of the guards.

Adrian took a moment to focus on his _Sword Projection_ skill and created four blades, he moved them into a vertical position, blade pointed at the roof and hilt pointed at the sky before having them _just _touch the roof. A moment of thought later all four have the lowest power Sword Beams activated and Adrian had moved them in a quarter circle.

Instantly a circular hole had been created and the stone that made up of the roof had been cut. It started falling but before even a second had passed Adrian created four more swords _below _the circular section of the roof and caught the cut section of the ceiling before it hit the ground.

He quickly flared his _Blindsight _and felt his heartbeat settle as he realized that nothing had gone wrong yet. Rabier was still asleep, his party hadn't been detected, the demi-humans were still alive and the guards were still as passive and inattentive as before.

Adrian slowly moved the circular section downwards and jumped into the hole which had a diameter of a meter or so. The room was quite warm thanks to the fireplace but it was getting colder now that it was exposed to the environment. He didn't waste any time and he called all eight of the Swords he had created, the four to make the hole and the four to carefully keep the section down without making a sound, and used _Sword Change_ on them.

Two of them became the _Seal Removal Sword, _two changed into the _Cursed Seal Sword _while the other four changed into forms that had a very, very high attack rating. In case this all went wrong they would blast the man...and most of his mansion. Adrian was grateful that the obelisk and the basement were in the opposite direction as the man's bed. He then created another two swords. These two would be used to keep him quiet.

A moment of thought and the Seal related swords and the final two swords he had created began to float above the man. Rabier didn't stir. Another instant and all four of his Sword Beam dedicated Sword aimed at the exact location of their target. A last-second where he double checked everything with _Blindsight _and then Adrian took a deep breath and willed his swords to _move._

Four Swords thrust into the man's body with ease. Two of them, the _Seal Removal Swords _pierced his shoulders while the _Cursed Seal Sword _cut into his knees. Rabier got up, a scream primed, and Adrian used his final two swords which were pointed at his throat and diaphragm, hilt first, it was the only reason he was alive as they slammed into him with enough force for him to cough up a wad of spit that landed on his chin. It silenced the nascent scream into a whimper.

The man's eyes were unfocused and terrified, Adrian watched it all with a strange detachment as he activated the _Seal Removal _process. When Rabier tried to move Adrian simply twisted the swords buried in his knees and silenced the scream by pressing the blade against his throat. By the time the Seals were destroyed and Adrian got a message on his HUD the man's bed was soaked in his blood as his shoulders and knees bled profusely. The smell of blood was much the same as most of the monsters he had killed.

Would this man die so easily? Adrian had assumed that like most monsters such simple injuries to non-critical spots would do limited damage. Had his assumptions about Rabier's level been false?

Adrian then triggered the Cursed Seal Sword and walked towards the man who had stopped struggling. It took no more than half a minute before he got a message on his Status Screen stating that Idol Rabier has been registered as a slave. Adrian set the punishment settings to maximum and made sure that he was not allowed to harm his party members, disobey or move away from him before adding the man to his party and moving closer to the man.

He blinked in surprise as he saw that the man still had more than half of his HP left _and that he was level 63. _Adrian frowned and quickly checked that man's stats, if they were too high, he would have to kill him here and now, and blinked in shock as he realized that while they were a little higher than Raphtalia. His filolials had stats that surpassed this man. Hell, _none _of Rabier's stats was even _half _of his, not even defence which was his worst stat and Adrian's attack was over ten times what the man had.

Adrian shook himself and drew out a powerful sleeping drug from his sword and walked up to the man who was struggling to breathe and poured the drug on his face, the man tried to shake his head and opened his mouth to scream, a mistake as it allowed the drug to enter his mouth and take _full _effect even as he roughly pulled out the four swords that he had embedded in the man _and _slammed down with a sword on the man's stomach.

Rabier choked and then began to cough. Adrian activated the Cursed Seal's punishment feeling a cold sense of satisfaction as the man began to writhe in pain before the drug fully kicked in and sent him off to sleep. It was quite impressive how despite the pain and limited amount, the drug had worked quite quickly. Then again the blood loss probably played a part in that.

Though the fact that the man _still _had half of his HP was a terrifying reminder of just how effective the level system of this world was.

Adrian quickly started moving the disc towards the basement from their position above the mansion. _Blindsight _guided him in the matter, while Adrian himself dragged the nobleman by the nightgown the man was wearing, grimaced at the blood coating the fat man, and pulled him out of the room using the circular hole that he had entered from, the meter diameter hole proving its' worth. He made sure to leave most of the projected Swords in there and changed their forms to a more explosive configuration.

Then he quickly moved nearly two kilometres up in the sky with Rabier in tow. The man's bleeding had already stopped which made Adrian a little nervous but he ignored the man's quick recovery and drew out one of his older wooden platforms and projected the Swords into the structure, dropped the man on them, tied him up as best as he could and then _let the man hang from the edge._ If the fool woke up and struggled he would get a one way trip to the afterlife.

Adrian took a look back on the ground and Dashed back to the surface as soon as he could. His party being outside of his _Blindsight _was making him very nervous.

It was a relief to find that they were waiting near the basement.

_****************************************************************************************_

_**Raphtalia**_

Raphtalia had not known what it would feel like to see this place again. She had assumed that she would feel scared or sad or _something _but it looked very different at night when she was floating so far above it that she could barely even see the buildings properly.

"Raphtalia," she heard Isis speak, "Please calm down. Father promised that things would be fine and he _always _keeps his promises."

She looked to the silver-haired girl and nodded, trying to follow her advice. had kept all his promises and despite what he had said he had always helped her but Rifana was right _there _she could almost imagine that she could hear her. Raphtalia tried to keep her tail from swishing about. It was an embarrassing habit.

Then the disc started to move, slowly at first but faster as time passed. Raphtalia quickly held onto one of the supports that were embedded onto the edge of the wooden carrier, the filolials did the same. She took a deep breath and held onto the bag in one hand and a small dagger in the other. Not for the first time she envied Isis and Trystan. They could both fight_._

It took them a very short amount of time to get to the ground and as they descended Raphtalia found herself beginning to shake as the features of the buildings around her slowly transformed into something familiar. Raphtalia couldn't help but remember the cage she had been in before. She swallowed and quickly jumped off the disc once they had reached close to the ground.

"The basement is there," she said after taking a deep breath, pointing at the small stairway that led to where Rifana was.

Trystan nodded, "Got it!" he said and transformed into his filolial form and ran down the stairway before slamming into the door with a loud clang. Raphtalia looked around but didn't see any guards...though she was sure that even if some did show up Isis would destroy them.

The door shattered like it was made out of glass and the Filolial quickly looked up and said, "Come on,"

"Yes, let's go," said , "and try to keep the noise down Trystan."

Raphtalia staggered back at his sudden appearance before noting that the disc was gone, probably absorbed by the Sword but she felt a sharp surge of relief. He was here which meant that Rabier no longer had any chance of killing Rifana. They were safe.

No. _That _wasn't true, she still had to get her out of this place.

"Let's go," he said, changing his sword into a form that radiated light, "Raphtalia please take the lead. Rifana is the first person you should see, please give her some medicine and then get her out as soon as possible. Isis, Trystan take care of the other two while I stand guard. Please make it as quick as possible."

Raphtalia nodded and quickly ran down the staircase and then stopped, stunned, as the _smell _started to make her hand shake, it was just like before. Suddenly she was hanging from a wall as _he _hit her again and again and again. A pain-_phantom pain- _she tried to remind herself, struck her side and her mind slowly slipped away.

"Are you okay?" asked Isis, breaking her out of her mental prison. Raphtalia didn't know how long she had been standing, frozen, in front of the door.

"Y-yes. I'll be fine," she said.

The girl looked sceptical but nodded and said, "Give us some medicines," pointing to herself and her brother who was back in his human form, "we'll need to heal the other two."

Raphtalia did so, fumbling with the bag a little but quickly giving out four doses of each type of medicine, the filolials took them and ran into the depths of the dungeon without hesitation. Raphtalia felt a bitter feeling emerge at their bravery. She cursed herself. She had failed her parents and everyone in the village and now she was failing her friend as well. Rifana was just a few steps away and she couldn't even _walk up_ to her.

Then she felt a hand on her shoulder, she turned quickly, half expecting a guard but when her punch was casually dodged she saw that it was Mr Adrian.

"S-sorry." she said, "I didn't-"

"I know. Let's go help your friend," he said and started to lead her by the hand.

"But you need to stand guard!" she said, "The plan-"

"The plan was overly cautious it is optimal for me to be here," he said, "rest assured that no one will come anywhere close without me knowing about it. As of this moment, none of the guards are even slightly wary."

Raphtalia silenced herself. Not willing to admit to how comforting it was to have him here. She knew that even if _that man _showed up Mr Adrian would defeat him in an instant. He was a lot like Sadeena. Ridiculously strong and very kind.

It didn't take them long to get past the empty cages to reach the familiar place where she and Rifana had been kept in, she winced a little but all her attention went to the girl who was lying in the filthy, wet straw. Her eyes were open but she wasn't looking at anything.

The Sword Hero slashed through the door without even trying, the two halves of the door started to fall before he caught them and gently put them down, he then walked towards Rifana, Raphtalia followed but he seemed to just disappear and reappear, one moment he was in front of the now-destroyed gate and the next he was kneeling at Rifana's side with a bottle of medicine in hand that he was carefully pouring into her mouth.

Raphtalia winced as she noticed that Rifana hadn't even tried to resist as moved her and slowly emptied the bottle. She knelt down beside them and said, "Rifana, can you hear me?"

Raphtalia waited for a long moment. "Rifana," she said again, her voice a little louder, but the girl didn't respond at all. Her vision blurred when Rifana didn't respond, she wiped away with her sleeve viciously. "Rifana! Please say something…"

"She's healing and needs some rest and food," said, withdrawing another bottle and some cloth from his sword which he slowly poured over her wounds after tearing off the rags that Rifana was covered in. He gently picked her up after wrapping her in the cloth once all her wounds had been drenched in the potion which had instantly been absorbed.

"Father!" she heard Isis say, "We've got them!"

Raphtalia turned to see Isis, Trystan and two other Demi-humans who were standing behind them, looking scared. Neither of them were badly injured and Raphtalia felt a small surge of bittersweet emotion. Why was Rifana the only one so badly hurt?

Mr Adrian stood up, she quickly did so as well, and nodded, "Good job you two," he said, "Any emergency concerns?" he asked Isis.

"No father," she replied quickly, "their injuries are healed and they are good enough to move."

He nodded briskly and then looked to her, "Please hold her. I'll take the lead and give you a signal once we're in the clear."

He handed Rifana to her and then a large Sword appeared in the cell, "when that changes form please come on out. Okay?" he asked.

Raphtalia quickly nodded as she adjusted her friend, feeling a sense of disorientation as she realized that she _could _hold her friend in her arms so easily.

Mr Adrian walked out of the cell, gave Isis and Trystan a pat on their heads, ignored the flinch that the two demi-humans performed and vanished. Less than ten seconds later the sword changed form and all of them started to move out. Trystan in front, Isis in the back and the rest of them between them.

When the got up the staircase they found the wooden carrier floating slightly above the ground while the Sword Hero stood up on top of it. Carefully scanning the surroundings.

Trystan jumped on without hesitation but one of the demi-humans hesitated and that made the other hesitate as well.

Raphtalia moved past them, carefully lay Rifana down, and then spoke to them, "Please don't be scared. I promise that we just want to help you. I was hurt, just like you were, by that man."

The looks turned from fear and wariness to confusion.

"Look, you can stay here and get hurt again or come with us," said Isis bluntly as she jumped onto the disc, "you're wasting _time._ Come on."

_That _got them moving and soon enough they were on the disc and were flying away from that place. Raphtalia sat down next to Rifana and moved her friend's head into her lap. Not quite able to believe that Rifana was still alive, that she would be okay.

It took them no time at all to reach high above the city and an even lesser fragment of time before they had started to move away from it but when they had just reached the edge of the town, right above the walls, she heard a massive explosion and turned to see that a bright orange glow was coming from the mansion.

Raphtalia turned towards Adrian after the sudden burst of colour reduced in intensity and saw him smiling. It wasn't the same smile that he offered Trystan or Isis. He didn't look happy. It was more like a baring of teeth. A promise of pain.

A guilty sort of joy flared up at watching the destruction from afar but soon any thought of it vanished from her mind as she slowly traced the features of her friend.

Rifana was safe. What more could she ask for?


	22. Chapter 22

_**Raphtalia**_

Rifana seemed to be sleeping peacefully, her breathing was regular and calm and she had a gentle look on her face. It should have reassured Raphtalia that everything was going to be okay, that her friend would recover but the truth put a stop to that. Mr Adrian had fed Rifana some sort of paste-like substance that he said would help her get the nutrients she needed after being starved for days but he had also told he that it contained something to help her get some proper rest.

Raphtalia made sure that she was comfortable in the disc that Mr Adrian had decided to keep around even while they weren't travelling and she was using a part of it as a bed for Rifana. She knew from personal experience that it was warm and comfortable but she still made sure to keep an eye on her friend. It was probably not necessary. Her wounds had been healed, Mr Adrian had managed to get her to level 15 to boost her growth so that whatever small injuries remained would be healed _and _she had been given a lot of food that Rifana had eaten listlessly without saying a word. She should probably be learning magic like Isis was or cheering up the other two children they had rescued like Trystan was but she found her mind wandering to Rifana constantly.

She hoped that their hopes would turn out to be true. Raphtalia was pretty sure that Mr Adrian would be okay with taking them home since their village was pretty close by.

She took a deep breath, let it out and then turned her mind to the book in her hand. It was difficult to decipher, the words seemed to shift and change, she understood the letters and the words that they formed but there was something still missing.

After another series of attempts she found her mind wandering and looked over at Isis who was carefully reading over each word, her focus scarcely wavering. Raphtalia considered asking her for some help but dismissed the idea, it would be wrong to interrupt her while she was working, instead, she put the book down, took another look at Rifana and looked at Trystan and the two new children who had joined their group.

Alvin and Razieh were two children from the same village. Razieh had lost her parents a few years ago and Alvin's parents had taken her in, so they were siblings in all but blood. Thankfully both of them had been bought less than a day ago and so had not been hurt very badly by _that man_. It made her feel strange to see the angel-winged boy and the two children play with an orange coloured ball that Mr Adrian had pulled out of the Legendary Sword.

A part of that was because she _knew _that Trystan was _much, much _stronger and faster than them but mostly it was because she remembered playing with Rifana, Keel and all the others. When she saw them playing she couldn't help but wonder where everyone else was. Raphtalia felt furious at the realization that most of them were likely still enslaved, being tormented by their masters, and worse, it made her feel guilty. None of them were lucky enough to be rescued by a Hero.

Raphtalia looked down at Rifana who looked so small, so peaceful and wondered if this was Rifana's luck _not _her own. Hadn't it been her who had wished for a hero to save them? Maybe she had been saved so that Mr Adrian could save Rifana.

Raphtalia looked in the opposite direction from where Trystan and the others were playing. She knew that somewhere there Mr Adrian was talking to Rabier. He had offered to let her come with him as long as she didn't interfere when he was interrogating the man.

He had offered to let her kill Rabier. Raphtalia had reflexively refused and he had simply nodded before promising that Rabier would be dead by the end of the day. Then he had walked off seemingly empty-handed but she knew that Rabier had been floating above them on a second disc.

When she focused she could almost imagine that she could hear that voice screaming at her to _stop _smiling_, _to _cry._ She could hear his laughter after Raphtalia had forgotten how to smile, see his cruel visage when he had seen her cower away from him when he had selected her to be his _toy_ for the day.

"Raphtalia!" she heard and then blinked away the tears in her eyes before turning to look at Isis who had been tugging at her hand.

The silver-haired girl looked at her with a worried look in her eye before asking, "Are you okay? Should I call father here?"

Raphtalia shook her head, she wasn't sure if her voice would work right but it didn't reassure Isis who spoke again.

"Are you sure?" she asked, hesitant and unsure and Raphtalia felt her guilt surge at watching the normally confident girl struggling to help her.

"I'm fine," she said, trying to inject some strength into her voice. Raphtalia winced internally at how unconvincing her voice sounded.

"I'll call father," she said firmly, her hand letting go of Raphtalia's and raising it to the sky, preparing to chant.

"No," said Raphtalia, "I-I just-" she trailed away, unsure of what to say.

Isis lowered her hand but the uncertain look reappeared on her face before she lit up and said, "You can go speak to father! He asked you if you wanted to come right? So you can go to _him._"

The transformed filolial pointed in a different direction from what she had thought Adrian had gone and said, "He's pretty close in that direction, just keep going straight ahead."  
"I don't need to speak-" said Raphtalia and then cut herself off.

It was true she didn't need to speak to him right now. He would return soon enough. What Raphtalia needed to do was see _Rabier_. She needed to know _why _he had hurt her, hurt Rifana and the others.

She swallowed the fear that came up and ignored her shaking arms, instead, she turned to Isis and asked, "Where is he exactly?"

Isis smiled, happy to help, and pointed in the right direction. Raphtalia took at a look at the setting sun, oriented herself and then started to walk.

Raphtalia headed into the sparsely forested woods, the fading light from the sun sufficient to guide her. She didn't worry about monsters, Adrian was sure to have taken care of them, so she just walked carefully, taking care not to stumble over the uneven terrain. Her high level making it easy to walk the distance.

When she had been walking for a minute or two a floating sword flew towards her before it started to guide her in a slightly different direction then what she had been taking. Raphtalia felt a surge of gratitude toward the Sword Hero who was watching over her even now and followed the floating blade.

When she found Mr Adrian it was with him staring at a horribly wounded man whose clothes had been dyed with blood. The man was leaning against a tree, pinned to the ground by two swords embedded in his legs, his wounds shut only because the wounds had been _burned _until they stopped bleeding. She could tell that he had managed to urinate all over himself, the smell was telling. His arms were bound behind his back and there were two swords, _two explosive swords, _floating near his head while another five floated around the man. Ready to kill him.

Raphtalia couldn't believe that this was the same man who invaded her mind when she slept. She hated this man, hated him in a way she had never imagined she _could _hate. More than the waves or the knights who had destroyed her village, more than the monster who killed mama and her hate she had always known that he was strong. Too strong to fight or stop.

He wasn't strong now.

Rabier had not even noticed her even though Mr Adrian had nodded at her before raising a finger to his lips. His sword had guided her to come at an angle that Rabier would not be able to easily see her from. The nobleman was rambling away a terrified look on his face as Mr Adrian asked him question after question. He didn't stop and the one time he hesitated the Curse Seal that Mr Adrian must have branded him with activated and he screamed.

He didn't stop talking after that.

Raphtalia barely heard what the man was saying, she heard the sounds but it was like the words were beyond her comprehension, all she could do was stare at the broken, bleeding remnant of her tormentor. Of _Rifana's _tormentor.

She didn't know when she had reached for one of the floating swords. She didn't know when she had stepped fully into view of the fat man but suddenly she was in front of him, the massive sword held in her hand like it was weightless. Raphtalia could hear him say something but the words were meaningless so she didn't answer.

It was like reality had skipped a beat. One moment he was cowering and the next he was cut in half and she had blood splattered over her face. He was dead she _knew _that but she swung her blade again and again, less as a sword and more like a hammer.

She didn't know how long it had been when she came back to herself but she was looking at a bloody lump in front of her and was crying as Mr Adrian held her. 

**************************************************************************************************

_**Adrian**_

It was surprising how travel in a wooden disc-like shape that was flying by the virtue of magical swords that he controlled telekinetically had become normal. After helping Raphtalia clean up he had returned the exhausted girl to camp, absorbed Rabier, cleaned up the scene and then had started to move towards the town that Alvin and Razieh had lived at prior to their abduction by the slave hunters.

Adrian should have felt happy he had made a simple discovery after absorbing Rabier that would ensure that he would reach level fifty within the next day or in the worst case it would take him two days or so. Turns out that he could absorb a whole monster as long as it wasn't too big and _then _use _Dismantle _while it was in the item box to break it down and then absorb it.

He had verified it a dozen times over since then and the results were confirmed. Every possible variation that a monster could provide was unlocked by this simple procedure. Adrian felt like a fool for _not _having discovered this before it would have guaranteed that he would be at level 50 by now with Portal available for use given that most of his hunting time had been used for butchering his slain prey but he was happy enough that with this new discovery he could hunt efficiently while travelling over monster-infested areas.

It was a simple process. Kill monsters using a long-range attack, use _Dash _to get to them, absorb and then move on until all monsters are consumed and then return to the carrier which he had kept moving in the correct direction in the process and repeat. The only problem was that dismantling took a bit of time and the SP cost to this procedure was high enough that Adrian was actually taking SP potions but other than that it was perfect. Adrian had already  
reached level 44 in the five hours of their travel towards the Seatto Region and _Cal Mira._

But the image of Raphtalia after she had finished ravaging Rabier was stuck in his mind.

Every other member of his group of misfits was asleep at the moment. Rifana, Raphtalia and Trystan in his filolial form in one bundle while Isis slept at his side and Alvin and Razieh were tangled up in the same bed space. They looked peaceful but he was feeling rather guilty about how satisfied he was about her butchering the man.

Listening to Rabier for three hours had been horrific. The man had been determined to live and figuring out that Adrian was the sword hero had changed his rambles into _boasts_ about how he had done everything he had for God and that Adrian _must _have come to bless him and aid him.

Adrian had swallowed his fury at that thought and let the man have his delusions, he had assumed, correctly, that Rabier would be more willing to answer in that case, but after that piece of trash offered him a _demi-human _to entertain himself with...Adrian had lost control which had ended up with the scum's legs being burned horrifically.

The smell had been horrible and Adrian had found himself stunned at how far he had been willing to go but the unrepentant noble had only declared Adrian a heretic and had clamped up...for the next minute before the punishment from the Curse Seal opened up his mouth again.

He had learned a lot about the King, the nobles, about Mirellia and even about the Wave but if there was one piece of information that had underscored that he had been right about killing Rabier, right about _leaving _his party and the capital it was that the destruction of the Seatto Region had been hastily organized by the Church and Aultcray after the wave had struck.

Lord Seatto had not fallen during the wave he had been killed afterwards. His successors were imprisoned or killed, the lesser noble houses destroyed or relocated, if they swore loyalty, and the people of the region hunted down or enslaved. It was why he feared that Alvin and Razieh were going to be horrified at finding what was going to be their ruined homes. He would go anyway, if there was a chance that their family was there then they deserved an opportunity to find them.

Rabier had been proud of his King and the Church. Proud to serve God. The relish in his voice as he spoke of Demi-humans put to the sword had been the main reason that he had not stopped Raphtalia from killing him as she had. Rabier had deserved it for orchestrating genocide and there was nothing more fitting than a child he had tormented taking vengeance for her fellows.

He just hoped that his impulsive decision had not destroyed Raphtalia. It had taken no more than a second after Rabier had been butchered for him to doubt his decision. The blade she had used had been one of his projections, he _had guided her strikes, _he could have stopped it but in his rage at Rabier, his utter horror at just how many people the Pope and Aultcray had murdered he had felt like it was _right _for Raphtalia to have a chance at killing that piece of trash.

And he still believed that Rabier deserved to die. As did that Pope and Aultrcray. That was something even his flawed mind could grasp. Genocide was unforgivable.

But he shouldn't have lost control and let the burden of his fury fall on Raphtalia.

He sighed and looked at the girl who was sleeping peacefully. Maybe one day he would be smart enough to stop failing her. For now, all he could do was damage control.

Adrian promised to himself that he would be better, _wiser_. It was more important than it had even been before and it would become more so the greater his power soared.


	23. Chapter 23

Adrian sent out a couple of dozen blades flying towards his targets that were infesting what must have been a town that once sheltered thousands of people. Now they only had monsters and scavengers. Well, for the next couple seconds anyway.

Once they were dead, he double-checked for any survivors, both monsters and humans, and then used _Dash_ to move towards the town from the wooden carrier. Despite the carrier being nearly a kilometre up in the air it scarcely took a second to reach his destination.

Adrian felt an odd sort of guilt as he harvested both the monsters _and _the various remnants of the town. He absorbed the rotting, half-eaten corpses and the many, many signs that this place had once held thousands of people.

The toys, broken stalls in the marketplace, ruined homes and ravaged stores reminded him once more of the damage that the humans serving Aultcray and the Church had done. To be certain, a lot of the damage had been done by monsters, but this town was nowhere near the point where the Wave had originated from, any monsters would have had to travel a fair distance to get here, and the town showed signs of having once had a decent defence. A defence that had been shattered by humans allowing the monsters free reign to destroy the town.

It was disgusting and made Adrian wonder just how apathetic Mirellia had been regarding the fate of her own people if she had allowed Aultcray to get away with this in the Light Novel with a slap on the wrist...Of course, that assumed that she was _not _scum and that she truly wanted peace, he would not be surprised if it turned out that she was the mastermind behind the whole scheme with Aultcray just being a pawn in her game.

As he moved around the ruins, absorbing all that caught his eye, he found himself planning out the deaths of Aultcray and the Church. A moment's contemplation made one thing clear-He needed a _lot _more information. Rabier had given him a few names and some context but he needed more information regarding both Melromarc and the other nations of the world. To be certain Aultcray had committed a crime that was unforgivable but his death could cause war which would probably cost _more _lives than the genocide the man had orchestrated or permitted. Plus, if Mirellia had a part to play in this then he could assume that she would need to die as well, probably allowing numerous successors to come into play, throwing the nation into a sort of civil war. It was an interesting if horrible, possibility. Perhaps the Sword Hero could play Kingmaker? No, _Queenmaker,_ given that he was in a matriarchy right now.

Adrian dismissed his fantasies, he would reconsider his ideas _after _he obtained more information, and took one last look at the ruined town before he used _Dash _to return back to the carrier.

He nodded to Raphtalia who was staring up at him sleepily as the nascent sunlight began to emerge over the horizon and felt a smile emerge as she nodded back and started to say something before a yawn stopped her. Adrian sat down in a meditative position and started to move again even as Raphtalia got up and stretched a little before reaching for a bottle of water.

Adrian turned his attention from the young woman as she slowly adjusted her clothes a bit, moved out of the pile of feathers and limbs that she had been sleeping in, and turned her attention towards Rifana, Alvin and Razieh, making sure that they were all right.

He was almost sure that their current goal of reaching the hometown of the two kids was going to be fruitless. Between the monsters from the Waves, loss of most avenues of potential support and the horrific human actions...well there was almost no chance of getting away intact, the fact that Alvin and Razieh had been captured during a raid spoke volumes.

Still, it was a worthwhile goal to at least _try_. Even if he had already started to plan with the assumption that these kids would stay with him for at least a few more weeks.

"Good Morning Mr Adrian," said Raphtalia her voice quiet.

He nodded, "Morning," he said, drawing out a plate of food from his sword and handing it to the woman who took it with a quiet thanks.

They sat in silence as the darkness faded and the many colours of the sunrise filled the sky. It was beautiful, even more than normal thanks to his many sensory enhancements, but Raphtalia saw fit to shatter the peace that it had invoked.

"Mr Adrian," she said, hesitating for a moment, "Rifana isn't...she isn't doing well. I don't know what to _do._"

Adrian wanted to wince as her tone turned despondent. He did sigh, unable to help it.

"There is no easy solution Raphtalia," he said, uncertain of how to help but absolutely certain of one fact, "don't try to _fix _her, just make sure she knows that you're there for her and keep her healthy. Give her time and the opportunity to heal."

"Yes Mr Adrian," she said, determination colouring her tone. Raphtalia nodded firmly. She looked a _lot _happier with some semblance of a plan, even if it was nothing more than some trite advice, but in this case what she actually needed was a bit of assurance that Rifana _could _be okay.

Still, he felt a bit happy that he could help her a little. He was fairly certain that Alvin and Razieh would _not _be happy once they saw what was left of their town.

Adrian frowned as he double-checked the results of his observation with Telescopic vision and then turned to his party, "I'm going to harvest some monsters," he said.

Most of his party just nodded, Alvin and Razieh looked impatient but they didn't fully realize just how close they were to their hometown, and by this point, they had seen him harvest monsters dozens of times. So they had no reason to suspect that he was, in fact, planning to scout out their town.  
Their _intact _town.

Well, intact was a strong word, even from a distance he could see numerous signs of conflict and death, and as he drew closer to the town and it entered the range of his _Blindsight _more details became clear.

The town was based in a valley between two reasonably large mountains, fertile soils and rivers made this valley an excellent location for farming, and Adrian had noted a large number of villages while approaching the town. All of them had been destroyed, most of them by humans and Adrian had assumed that the same would hold true for the town. Instead, from what he could see, the town had survived, barely. The Graveyard at the back of the town...well, to say that there were more corpses there then there were people would be quite accurate. A town that was built for at least 2000-3000 people had scarcely 300 and their defences were badly damaged. Two guards at the gates, no patrols, a great number of injured folks _and _no real food stores that he could see.

Adrian carefully darted around the town, it was nearly three hours after noon, and the forest rapidly thinned out as he approached the town, but with the lack of sentries, he managed to get a full grasp on the town with ease.

It was quite horrible. Signs of attack by monsters and humans were evident, the cattle were dead, the crop storage had been set on fire, and as far as he could tell the people were only surviving _because _so many of them had been killed. It puzzled him slightly as to why they couldn't just hunt for food, however. Adrian himself had found _hundreds _of nearby monsters...unless those monsters were too powerful for the average person and their hunters had died earlier.

All in all, this was _not _a place where he could leave Alvin and Razieh. Adrian was far from a Saint but he was not willing to just dump two children in a place where their only fate was likely to be a slow death if they were lucky, _or _a swift and brutal one, if they were not. Limited food and water, no medicine as far as he could see, horrific lack of security, especially considering that while he had not seen any raiders, they _should _be here _and _the threat of monsters.

Adrian double-checked his observations and conclusions and then used _Dash _to move vertically upwards before returning to his carrier. Certain that his first impression had been correct and tempted to help these people out. As he sat down after his return and greeted Isis with a smile, he turned his attention to his Sword, checking his resources and skills, and confirming his abilities.

It didn't take long to realize that he _could _help _if _he was willing to take time away from his training for the Wave. Adrian took a deep breath and tried to look at the situation objectively but he couldn't help but remember the images of the people in that town, the injured lying around in pain, the listless way most of them went about their tasks ...and the many, many corpses in shallow graves.

It didn't escape his notice that most of the survivors were children or normal people. The Slave hunters must have not been allowed to abduct them freely but the cost had been the lives of every person who had been willing to fight.

He turned towards Alvin and Razieh, "I believe that your town is up ahead," he said, "Alvin, I'd like to take you down there _first_. We will verify that this is the correct location and make sure that we're welcome here before the rest of us land."

The wolf demi-human boy jumped up, and looked over the edge, Adrian smiled when he ended up looking in the wrong direction, "There kid," he said, pointing.

Alvin turned immediately, as did the rest of his party, the boy's eyes widened, "That's it! Ayrith! We're back home!"

He turned back to Razieh and gave her a huge hug, the girl adjusting her talons and made sure not to hurt him before returning the gesture, tears in both their eyes. Adrian wasn't sure if he _wanted _to break the news of just how bad the condition of their hometown was, considering the distance they were at, it was likely that the children hadn't even noticed the damage.

Adrian turned to the rest of his party, making sure _not _to stare at Rifana who was looking at him apprehensively as she held on tightly to Raphtalia, "I'll be sure to retreat if things get hostile," he promised.

Raphtalia frowned, "Is that likely?" she asked, a little sceptical.

Adrian sighed, "The town is badly damaged, I assume that it was because of the Slave Hunters, who were _humans._ I doubt I'm going to get a very good reception here."

Isis interrupted here, "I can come with you father," she said, "We'll have more power that way."

"I can retreat with ease Isis," he said calmly, "with Alvin in my arms, _Dash _shall move me far outside of their range of attack within an instant. Plus, we _don't _want to attack them, they're just people who've probably been spooked thanks to the attack against them."

She nodded, reluctant to concede, but logical enough to do so. It was remarkable just how mature she was despite being alive for less than a week.

"They won't hurt you, Mr Adrian," reassured Alvin, "We can _all _go right now! I'm sure gramps and mama and papa will be really happy to see you."

"That would be the best-case scenario," he admitted, "but let us take no chances. Alvin with me, I'll land the disc close by so that you all can respond if things get problematic, I'll make sure to retreat and send out a signal, probably a Sword Beam, straight up in the sky."

At the chorus of agreements, with the conspicuous silence from Rifana, Adrian moved the carrier closer to the ground and soon enough he had Alvin in his arms and they had started to approach the village.

Adrian _didn't _use his _Dash _to simply appear inside or near the village. He couldn't imagine how much that would spook them, so he walked slowly towards the town after using _Dash _to cover most of the distance. Alvin was impatient but a single look quelled his excitement to manageable levels.

"I can walk by myself Mr Adrian," he said, squirming in his arms.

Adrian shot the boy an annoyed look which silenced him, "Wait until we can be certain that this is safe. It will cost us some time if I need to pick you up before retreating."

"But we don't need to run!" said Alvin.

Adrian sighed, "Alvin just entertain my request," he said.

The boy pouted but conceded. He still looked around, excitement in his eyes, but stayed quiet. Though Adrian was certain that at least a part of the reason for that was the damage that his town had suffered through.

It didn't take them long to reach the line of sight of the guards.

"S-stop!" said the fox demi-human holding a spear, trying to move into a ready position, while the guard, a wolf demi-human woman, got her sword at the ready.

Adrian did as he asked, wondering just what these poor fools would have done if he _had _been a hostile force. He winced a little as he realized that in that case they likely would not even have gotten a chance to _realize _that they and their entire town had been decimated. After all, a Single Sword Beam would wreck this little place utterly.

"Who are you human?!" asked the same guard. He could see that they were quite displeased with his presence...displeased and terrified in the case of the wolf-demihuman who was actually shaking.

Adrian looked towards Alvin who quickly spoke up, "Aunty Em! It's me, Alvin."

The fear was erased rapidly as the woman looked away from him and towards the child in his arms.  
"Is that really you?" she asked as if staring at an illusion, she quickly looked towards the fox who also looked stunned and then turned back towards Adrian and the kid.

The kid who was currently struggling to make him let go of him, Adrian sighed but placed the boy on the ground. Alvin didn't hesitate to run towards the woman and cling onto her. It didn't take long for the waterworks to start from both participants of the hug. It was quite touching but it left the other guard looking at Adrian in confusion. The awkwardness was terribly amusing.

"I'm Adrian," he said, "I rescued this kid and another named Razieh from a slaver," no need to mention that said slaver was a dead nobleman.

The guard seemed even more confused and looked to the woman for guidance. Unfortunately for him, she was far more occupied in hugging the breath out of Alvin. Adrian waited patiently even as the fox guard began to fidget, he ignored the spear that was still pointed at him, feeling rather apathetic regarding the weapon. Hard to feel scared of someone when you could annihilate them within a fraction of a second.

After nearly a minute of her asking Alvin questions with the occasional glance sent his way she walked up to him, her weapon out of the way and Alvin's hand in hers.

She bowed deeply before she said, "Thank you for returning Alvin to us."

Adrian nodded, but got straight to the point, "You're welcome Miss but I wished to speak to your leader _and _bring in the rest of my party if possible."

She hesitated here but nodded, "Of course, please bring Razieh and your companions here. Our hospitality will be lacking due to our...unfortunate situation but you are an honoured guest."

That last phrase meant something. The fox demihuman looked a little surprised and Alvin smiled brightly. Still, his goal had been achieved. Initial contact had been positive...now it was time to leverage that.

Adrian smiled, "Thank you. I'll be right back."

He vanished in a _Dash. _The fear and shock that the two adult demi-humans showed was something he savoured. After all, he had _just _shown them that if he had so desired they would have never seen him coming.

That fear would keep them in line even if gratitude soured.

The old wolf type demi-human was deceptively simple looking. Adrian could tell that he was undoubtedly the strongest person in the village in terms of mana reserves thanks to his _Blindsight_, though it was not very impressive, and the man was quite well built. All of this served to distract from his shrewd intelligence.

Under normal circumstances, if the power dynamic between them was more equal, he would have been a difficult opponent. Now? With his town in ruins, his people in trouble and him being in debt to Adrian for saving his grandson and adopted granddaughter...well let's just say Adrian had the advantage. And _both _of them knew it.

Adrian ensured that he was aware of the whole town, there hadn't been any hostile movements even after he had taken his leave, and his arrival with his party had actually _relaxed _the people in town after it became obvious that they were all demi-humans of one kind or another. The people still looked at him suspiciously but did nothing more. And if they _did _choose to act then Adrian was quite certain that it would be the work of mere seconds to crush them all with ease.

"Thank you for helping the children," said the old man after they had finished greeting each other, Adrian, Raphtalia and Isis were seated in a small room near the centre of town with the old man and his daughter, the guard who had greeted him at the entrance to the settlement.

"It was incidental. Raphtalia here," he said pointing to her, "wished to aid her friend and it was in the process of doing so that we were able to aid Alvin and Razieh."

"Then our thanks extend to you as well young lady," he said with a smile, "Thank you for freeing them and bringing them home. I'm afraid that we cannot provide a suitable reward for your bravery but please rest assured that you have our gratitude"

Adrian smiled at the man, "Actually there is something that I think you can help me out with." he said, noting that the man was apprehensive and that his daughter was wary, "I am rather new to Melromarc and need a _lot _of information. If you help me out I'll be glad to consider any debt we have settled."

The old man smiled, a genuine one unmarred by worry, and said, "Of course Mr Adrian,"

Their conversation began to flow after that and Adrian was quick to ask about the current situation _and _about the notable nobles both here and across the border. Raphtalia and Isis were silent for most of the conversation though eventually, they left along with the old man's daughter.

The hours he spent with the wolf demi-human were enlightening and they steeled his resolve. He would help these people and they, in turn, would be the start of his power base in Melromarc. Adrian didn't intend for them to fight for him or anything like that but simply having a place where he could retreat to without the constant worry of betrayal would be worthwhile and this remote town might serve as a wonderful position for such.

"Thank you," said Adrian, taking a bite out of a plate of food that he had served himself, the old man had a similar plate in front of him that was quite empty.

"Not at all," said the old man, "a short conversation is hardly something onerous. But" he started, hesitating for a moment before continuing, " where did this food…"

Adrian smiled at the man before waving his cloaked hand, where his sword was in the form of a small knife was hidden, over the table, making a small feast appear from nowhere. It was simple fare, grilled meat with some spices and meat, but the old man just gaped at the meal.

"I have fairly powerful magic that lets me store food _and _medicine. More than enough to feed thousands if need be," he said, making a small bottle of medium quality medicine appear alongside a healing potion, "I can also store healing potions. I'd be happy to give them to you in exchange for some more information."

The man looked uncertain but nodded grimly, he recognized that Adrian was offering a _very _unbalanced deal. Adrian didn't smile but it was a close thing, this old man was the honourable sort. He didn't treat debts lightly by simply _giving _him food and medicine he had practically ensured that no one from his party would struggle here.

Make no mistake, Adrian didn't think that they would turn on him anyway, but it was better to be safe. Plus, he _did _want to help these people and ensure that Razieh and Alvin had a decent place to stay.


	24. Chapter 24

Raphtalia smiled. The people were talking to each other, dancing to the music that some of the townsfolk had started playing and _not _worrying about their meal for once. The children were running around excited, taking a bite before starting to play again and no one was stopping them.

It was nice to see the town come alive again.

When she had first entered the town with Mr Adrian and the rest of their group they had been greeted with suspicious looks, the children had been hidden away and fear. She'd felt a little bad about that but after Mr Adrian and Trystan had healed most of their injured their mood had changed. Some of them were still worried but the ambience had improved a lot. The feast that Mr Adrian and Mr Oldrin had set up just enhanced that good mood further. Everyone was celebrating, it was like a festival, just without any games or merchant stands.

Raphtalia had been staying at Rifana's side, making sure that she ate something, hoping but not expecting that she'd feel a little bit better. For a time her expectations had come true, until Trystan had dragged Rifana and Isis towards the town's children, asked Adrian for a ball, and started playing.

Raphtalia smiled a little as Rifana played with them, the shadows on her face vanishing for once. She almost looked like what she used to before.

"Miss Raphtalia," said Mr Oldrin, walking up to her with a glass full of water, "Have you seen Sir Adrian?"

Raphtalia greeted the man and found herself looking around to see if Mr Adrian was nearby. She checked at the tables where the food was laid out, it had been where he had been standing in the beginning, but found nothing. A quick look around the rest of the area confirmed her suspicions. He wasn't here, or to be more accurate, he wasn't _visible _here.

"I'm sorry," she said sheepishly, "I'm not sure where he went but he'll be back soon. I'm sure of it. Is it something critical?"

The old man shook his head, "Not at all young lady. I just wanted to thank him," he said, "I haven't seen my people like this in...weeks. It's more than I could have hoped for. Please ask him to meet me when you see him."

She nodded and he gave her a deep bow before walking towards a small cluster of people. Raphtalia frowned, scanned the area once more, and then checked on Rifana, Trystan and Isis -they were fine- before starting to look for Mr Adrian.

Raphtalia started to move, trying to think about what Mr Adrian would do. She knew that for all that he could talk to people, he didn't _like _doing it. He would be away from most people in the party so she started to move away from the centre of the celebration, nodding at the greetings and thanks sent her way and tried to figure out where he could be.

It was when she was reasonably far from everyone else that he found her.

"Looking for me Raphtalia?" he asked, appearing next to her without warning.

She didn't react beyond turning towards him. At this point, his sudden appearances and disappearances were something comforting.

"Mr Adrian," she said, "Mr Oldrin wanted to speak to you."

He raised his eyebrow, "I assume that he wants to thank me _again_," he said like it was ridiculous.

She nodded and waited for him to disappear, but he just turned to look at the celebration, the flickering fires giving his expression a very sad look.

"Is something wrong?" she asked, it was a question without thought, but it was one that she was happy to have asked. Mr Adrian had helped these people, dozens of injured people were well again, they had a medicine and food stockpile and Mr Adrian had promised to hunt down the nearby monsters. Ayrith would be okay soon but despite this Adrian had looked very sad and quite angry as he looked around town.

He sighed and turned towards her, "I don't understand them." he admitted, "no, I suppose its' Oldrin that I don't understand. How can he be even _slightly _happy with _this_, his people are still about to die. All we've done here today has delayed it slightly...it just doesn't make sense. Hell, shouldn't he be _suspicious _about the human who just decided to help him for nothing?"

Raphtalia felt a little odd realizing just how cynical Mr Adrian really was. A lot of things made sense, his caution when it came to entering both this town and the previous one, the reason why he _always _made sure that she never faced a living monster that was truly dangerous, even _why _he didn't want her to fight despite leveling her up. She didn't think he was scared...but he was someone who was always thinking about the worst.

"You're not going to stop helping them," she pointed out after a moment of thought, "Mr Adrian, I _know _that you must have at least some ideas on how to help them in the future as well. Maybe he's happy because he knows that."

He snorted and then waved his hand dismissively, "Ideas? Sure I have a few, but it's nothing concrete and even then I can't imagine anything that can keep them safe from the Slave Hunters in the long run. Not when they've got the King _and _practically every nearby noble family prepared to hunt them down."

Raphtalia felt a little off-balance, "the King?" she asked.

The Sword Hero turned to look her straight in the eye, "Rabier confirmed my suspicions. Aultcray gave a direct order to see the Demi-humans in the Seaetto Region executed or enslaved. It's why there was such a massive response _and _why the Lord of the Region found himself killed," his voice was calm, but she could hear the undertone of fury, "combine that with the monsters from the wave and, well...it was basically is a death sentence for every single person in this territory. I have no way to stop that right now...well, not without going to extremes."

Raphtalia was suddenly reminded of the fact that Rabier had found a recording in a crystal ball, a recording of her home being destroyed, she swallowed once she realized that they _must _have planned the attack on her home otherwise they would have never known that they needed proof. It had to have been sanctioned otherwise they would not have wantedto keep proof.

She wanted to laugh or cry or _something._ The _King _wanted them dead.

"Then...what are we going to do?" she asked, her voice a whisper.

He sighed, all the fury and frustration leaving him, "I'm trying out a few things," he admitted, tossing a small object into the soil near them and then pouring a liquid from a bottle "this is one of them."

Raphtalia frowned and looked carefully at the colourless liquid that was clearly notwater and the small object, which was a seed of some kind, nothing happen for a long moment. Then, in an instant, as if time had suddenly started to work again at a hundred times the speed, a small plant emerged. It took seconds to go from a seedling to a plant that was half her height and less than a minute to become as tall as she was laden with fruits and flowers.

She turned to Mr Adrian who was looking at the plant with a focused look, his hands twitched this way and that, and with every subtle movement, the plant grew.

He was controlling the plant's growth.

"Mr Adrian?" she asked, "what…" Unsure of _what _he was doing and what to ask him she just trailed off but he seemed to understand.

"Food, water, security." he stated, "these are the absolute basics that any group of people need. With the right types of plants, it is possible to obtain all three and I have several skills and plant types inside the Swords related to plant modification." He shrugged, "I still have to experiment a bit more but I'm fairly certain that I could make a fence-like structure which could double as a food and water supply with a bit more work."

"That's amazing," she said, completely meaning it. Raphtalia hadn't even been _thinking _about how they could help the people here long after they had left the town but Mr Adrian already had a solution.

He made a dismissive sound, "It's a possible solution that will work well for food and water. Security, however, is the main issue and I don't have many good ideas for it. I plan to clean up the Seaetto Region of the monsters within the next two or three days so they aren't a concern, but the human hunters won't go away for good just because I hunt them down once. They have their _orders_." He said orders like it was a curse.

"I'm sure you'll think of something." she said firmly, "And by the time you're done with the trees and the hunting I'm sure this town will have months to think of something even without our help."

He looked at her with surprise writ over his face, for a moment he said nothing then he smiled and looked at the stars. He was silent long enough for her to assume that the conversation was over. Then, "Thank you," he said, his voice softer, "I've missed having someone who's willing to cut down on my pessimism."

She wasn't sure what to say but he simply cut down the plant in front of them and vanished an instant later after nodding at her as a farewell. Raphtalia smiled a little, happy to have helped him. She started to walk back towards the celebration, she needed to make sure that Rifana was okay.

It was only after she saw Mr Oldrin that she remembered _why _she had been looking for him and turned back to find him again_._

The older woman in front of her winced as she was pushed off balance by Raphtalia's strike. Ms Nicol raised her hand, it was the signal they had agreed upon before that called for a stop.

She moved her spear over to her right hand and then rotated her wrists, before clenching her fists and relaxing it."You hit very, very hard," she stated, "but you need to be more aware of _where _you're landing your attacks if I had enough strength to counter that you then you would have been in a very bad position. Try doing something like _this," _she said while walking over to Raphtalia and showing her what she should have done.

Raphtalia nodded, Mr Adrian had warned her that her stats were about equal to a level 60's. Miss Nicol was only level 23. There was _no chance _that she could stand up to her stats. Even now Raphtalia had held back heavily. If she hadn't then Ms Nicol would probably have been hurt badly.

They tried a few more times. Nicol giving her advice on her stance, footwork and the way she was holding her blade before they sparred but eventually, the wolf demi-human frowned and sighed.

"You're _too_ strong for me," she admitted, "it won't be good for you to learn the basics while holding back this much. Let's make sure that your form is good and that you can deflect my hits and then you could try sparring with Mr Adrian or someone else who is closer to your Level."

"Yes Ms Nicol," she stated firmly, deciding to ask Mr Adrian about sparring with him, Isis or Trystan after they were finished here. She was fairly certain that she'd have more than enough energy to spar with them. She wasn't feeling even a little tired despite the fact that they had been practising for nearly an hour and a half.

Raphtalia had asked Ms Nicol to help train her after she had a second conversation with Mr Adrian last night. A conversation about her fighting with him, Isis and Trystan. Honestly, she had expected him to refuse or at least try to convince her _not _to fight. She had seen how much he worried about Trystan and Isis and how reluctant he had been to have them fight the waves despite the fact that as the Sword Hero he _needed _to fight the waves. To her surprise, he had nodded, asked her a few questions and then commanded her to fulfil a couple of conditions.

She was happy to note that he had only asked her to get some training with her preferred weapon, magic _and _then made sure that she was certain that this was what she wanted. Mr Adrian had even gone up to Mr Oldrin and had spoken to him about the trees and going out to hunt the nearby monsters. The old man's gratitude had been effusive and he had been more than happy to ask Nicol to train her in using a weapon and training her magic.

Of course, Mr Adrian had warned her to be careful and had noted that he had only agreed because this meant that they would stay for longer.

Still, her progress was excellent from what Ms Nicol had said. It had been nice to know that she was genuinely talented at using a sword...even if felt a little odd to play the role of a Swordswoman in a party with the _Sword Hero_.

So she practised and did so for several hours. Ms Nicol eventually left to fulfil her duties as a guard and Raphtalia eventually took a small break from her practice to drink some water, have a bite of the leftovers from last night and read her Grimoire.

Raphtalia did her best to study and was making steady progress with the basic light spell, "I, the source of all power, who has studied the laws of nature, command you. _Zuerst Light_."

Raphtalia kept her focus on her magic power, trying her best to keep it at the forefront of her mind, as the words just _entered _her mind as if they had always been there. And to her surprise a small floating light actually winked into existence, she smiled at it and then winced as it suddenly brightened and blinded her before vanishing.

She shook her head and rubbed her eyes a little, trying to make the spots in her vision go away. Raphtalia stared at her Grimoire after her eyes were back to normal, a little annoyed at the odd mixture of failure and success that she had just had. Still, she took a deep breath and then started to try again when she heard the dull roar of nearly a hundred people cheering at a distance.

Raphtalia looked towards the direction of the sound curiously and was rewarded by witnessing the rapid growth of a _massive _tree that towered over the town. It had dozens of low hanging branches on the part that was pointing _at _the town and none on the opposite side, and she could tell that it was full of fruits.

She smiled as she saw Mr Adrian fly up to one of the higher branches, pick up some of the fruits and then move back down. Another cheer went up soon after and Raphtalia had to admit to _some _curiosity, after all, she had never seen the finished product nor had she sampled the fruits.

It didn't take her very long to reach the site where Mr Adrian was planting the trees, it was a little far from the borders of the town, likely Mr Adrian just being cautious, but by the time she had reached there, he had already planted three trees and was working on the fourth.

Mr Oldrin spotted her before anyone else, "Young lady!" he said, his voice excited and disbelieving, two different types of fruits in his arms, but before he could say more, one of the children arrived, dragging her friend along with herself and started babbling at Raphtalia after offering her some of the fruit.

"Thank you," she said with a smile, patting the girl's head, taking a bite and then blinking at the odd sour-sweet taste of the yellow fruit. It was soft, yet firm enough that it was easy to hold, it felt dry but a single bite unleashed a _lot _of flavours. Raphtalia had never tasted anything like it...though given that Mr Adrian had somehow createdthe tree that bore it she shouldn't have been surprised.

Raphtalia nodded at Mr Oldrin before walking up to Mr Adrian who was carefully observing the planted trees, manipulating their growth so that there was some space in between them, it took her a moment to realize that he was making a gate.

"Raphtalia," he said in lieu of greeting her, without turning around, "Is there something you need?"

She could tell that he was still a little distracted so she just shook her head and observed. He nodded despite not looking at her and continued his work, he finished his modifications and she noted that it would probably take another ten or so trees before the entire town was covered and so she followed him along with the rest of the townsfolk as he planted the trees' in a circular pattern around town. He made sure to have only one gate _and _that there were several locations for sentries to be placed.

Once they were done Mr Oldrin walked up to Mr Adrian who was still carefully observing the final plant he had placed and bowed deeply, "Thank you, Sir," he said, "We can never repay you for your kindness. If there is anything at all that we can do…"

The old man trailed off and Adrian turned his full attention towards the wolf type demi-human, who stood straight in response, the rest of the town silent and attentive as the two men spoke.

"We have already come to an agreement," reminded Mr Adrian, "training for Raphtalia, information and a chance to rest here should we decide to return in the future you need not worry about any other cost."

His voice was firm but not cold and she could see the people around her calm down, "I'll leave some herbicide that can remove the plants and a few seeds that will grow rapidly, you won't be able to shape the trees as I have but you can at least place a stopgap if one or two of these trees are destroyed." he continued.

Mr Oldrin bowed deeply again, "Thank you." he said and Mr Adrian nodded.

"We'll be going hunting today Oldrin," he said, "I'd like all the information you can give me on the terrain and the monsters, both new and old, as soon as possible."

"Of course," said the town leader, "Please allow me to summon our hunters, they can tell you all you need to know." then he turned to his people and continued, "Everyone, please begin to harvest some of the fruit…"

While Mr Oldrin gave his orders Adrian walked up to her and asked, "Was there something you needed?"

Raphtalia nodded, "I just wanted to know whenwe'll be leaving so that I can get ready."

Mr Adrian frowned, "An hour or two," he said, "I want to make sure that the plants behave within my expectations and then set out some food for the people here to have a decent amount in their storage. We can leave after that. Make sure to get Rifana ready, I'll deal with Isis and Trystan."

Raphtalia nodded immediately and then hesitated before she said, "About Rifana…"

"I want to level her up," he said calmly, "It'll be safer for her and help her healing if she's at a high level. I promise that we'll keep her safe, the monsters around here are _much _weaker than in Dragon Territory."

Raphtalia swallowed her doubts and held onto that promise, "All right," she said.

He smiled and said, "We'll keep her safe." he reiterated and she nodded, surprised that she believed him.

Raphtalia found it eerie how different the world around her looked when she was expected to fight the monsters that populated it. She hadn't realized it until now but she had simply taken it for granted that Adrian, Isis and Trystan would defeat any of the monsters that would be encountered by their group. She didn't think it was an incorrect belief. Adrian had taken care to ensure that no monster that could pose a threat would be alive in her presence, but it was a reminder of how much she had come to depend on Mr Adrian even before she had realized that he was a nice person.

It was a little late at night and it had been around three or four hours since they had taken their leave from the town. After Mr Adrian had confirmed that the trees he had used to create a wall around town were fine and had Isis test them out to see how much damage they could endure, a _lot _as it turned out, they had arranged for lunch, left several weeks worth of food and then said their goodbyes for the moment.

She had felt a little bad about leaving them behind without making absolutely sure that they were safe but Mr Adrian had reassured her that once he got to level 50 and unlocked a teleportation skill they could return here at their leisure and ensure that the people of Ayrith were safe and sound.

At the moment Mr Adrian and Isis were preparing to test out a Combination Skill and both of them had their eyes closed as they concentrated on their magic. Rifana was sitting down in the floating Disc that had once carried her and the Filolials when they had been young and Trystan was standing next to her in his Filolial form watching the two members of their party who were preparing to attack attentively.

"We are the source of all power and so we command the world. Obey. One Hundred Lightning Strikes," both of them intoned in perfect synchronization as if they had practised it a hundred times. Raphtalia waited for something to happen, and for an instant, she wondered if something had gone wrong before Mr Adrian held his sword up, the tip pointing towards the clear sky, and exhaled loudly.

At first, a single sword, wreathed in lightning, emerged and quickly moved upwards until all she could follow was the bright light that the lightning emitted but as it went higher and higher the brightness intensified as one Sword became two, two turned into four and they kept on dividinguntil the sky was lit up with a hundred swords covered in lightning.

Mr Adrian swung downwards and the swords _moved_. Raphtalia could only see bright streaks of light moving across the sky and soon enough they were out of her line of sight, but she could _hear _the results. Screams and screeches of pain rang out and were silenced mere instants after they were first born. Bright bursts of light would flash out from distant locations, she couldn't see what was happening but she could guess.

Raphtalia felt a small surge of pity for the helpless monsters that had just been slaughtered. That pity died a quick death after she remembered that these were the _same _monsters spawned from the Wave.

"That worked quite well." noted Mr Adrian, "we'll have to try that out with a Thousand Swords and possibly Ten Thousand Swords should the cost be reasonable. It'll make a good move at the beginning of a Wave. How bad is the MP cost?"

Isis frowned, closing her eyes, "I can do that around fifteen-no twenty, around twenty more times Father. Anything more and I'll be exhausted."

Mr Adrian nodded slowly, "We'll have to see how much your reserves improve with your Class Up and the Levels you'll gain afterwards. Still, it seems that this is a pretty good Anti-Army move. We'll practice it again if we find an area with a lot of monsters...actually, this will be _very _good at dealing with underwater monsters. We'll have to try it out when we get to the coast."

Isis smiled up at Mr Adrian, "Yes Father," she said, happy to have been praised.

Raphtalia felt a little bittersweet. The lightning reminded her a lot of Sadeena. She had always been really, really good at lightning magic. Raphtalia remembered when Sadeena had created a _huge _lightning bolt and slammed it into the ocean so that she could get the fish more easily. Papa had been _really _mad that Sadeena had been lazy instead of fishing properly.

They continued to move after that but it was nearly half an hour later that they got anywhere near their next monster. Mr Adrian called for a stop once they were a few hundred meters from it.

"Raphtalia," he said, turning towards her, "these ones are yours to fight if you wish it. Trystan shall be your back-up but you'll be the one on point. It's a small troop of Skeletal Knights."

She nodded, feeling a slight thrill of anticipation, she knew that she was stronger than these monsters but that knowledge _didn't _help her feel confident. Instead, she tried to remember her lessons with Nicol, made sure that the grip she had on her sword and shield was fine, took a deep breath and then moved forward towards her target, Trystan a few steps behind her.

They didn't sneak up on the monsters, but they still had the advantage of surprise as the monsters were facing away from them, and she moved towards the Skeletal Knight on the back of their little formation and slashed through its' torso with ease.

The resistance of the bones and leather armour proved to be no match for her sword. She backed off after the first elimination, letting Trystan slam into the Knights, scattering them and ruining their formation. She took advantage of this and took down another Knight, one that had been separated from the group.

By the time she was done Trystan had taken care of the other three survivors.

Raphtalia stopped and realized abruptly that she was actually breathing really quickly, it was odd how the sound of her heartbeat had been negligible until she actually stopped. She took a quick look around, making sure that the Skeletons weren't moving before relaxing a little.

Mr Adrian, Isis and Rifana entered the clearing soon after and she winced as she saw the relieved look on Rifana's face. Her friend must have been scared. It was interesting to see the contrasting expressions on the other two, Mr Adrian simply nodded at her and began to absorb the skeletons while Isis just ignored everything in favour of watching the surroundings.

She had wanted Mr Adrian to compliment her. Raphtalia quickly shook off the thought, it had been stupid to expect the defeat of a couple of monsters to be impressive when Mr Adrian regularly slaughtered hundredsin seconds.

They continued their hunt, Trystan and Isis didn't get any experience as they were at level 40 and Raphtalia reached that level soon as well but Mr Adrian and Rifana kept leveling up. It turned out that because the three of them were at level 40 any experience they earned went to Mr Adrian and Rifana. By the end of the day, Rifana was at level 32 and had already started to eat a lot_. _

They sat down and had a proper dinner a few hours after sunset, Mr Adrian told them that they'd have to start early tomorrow as they'd have to move to another location, apparently, they'd pretty much depopulated the entire area around Ayrith of monsters. She could tell that he wasn't happy about that. He was still at level 47. He _really _wanted to get to level 50.

Trystan just sat down in his Filolial King form while Isis climbed on his back and slept there with a quilt. Mr Adrian would be up for the first watch so Raphtalia moved her sleeping bag next to Rifana who had barely spoken a word during Dinner. Even Trystan's best attempts had rarely drawn out a word.

Raphtalia _tried _not to feel angry at that man. Anger at him always reminded her of what she had done to him and she didn't want to think about him but she couldn't help it. Rifana's silence spoke louder than anything else. It was a brutal reminder that even with him dead _nothing _had been fixed.

No. Rifana had been saved. _That _was not something she could let herself forget.

"Goodnight Rifana," she said, lying down after making sure that she was covered up.

Her friend turned towards her and smiled, it was a hesitant smile, not at all like her old smiles but Raphtalia loved it anyway, "Goodnight," she said and closed her eyes, her voice still quiet, but she felt a deep sense of relief. She was talking.

Raphtalia fell asleep holding onto her friend.

She had no nightmares that night. Rifana was not that fortunate.

The next day was spent in battle.

She fought with Isis and Trystan for the most part with Mr Adrian spending most of the time hunting solo trying to reach level fifty. She made a lot of progress, got better at not doing stupid or necessary actions and did her best to apply the lessons that Nicol had taught her.

When they sat down for dinner an hour after sunset she knew that he had _not _reached level fifty. His frustration was telling. Still, he quickly pulled out some really tasty food, served it to them and started eating quickly. Raphtalia shook her head at his impatience but she understood. Teleportation was something he _really _wanted.

She turned her attention to Rifana who was eating her food ravenously.

"Is it good?" she asked, keeping her voice light.

Rifana nodded, barely taking her eyes off the food while eating.

Raphtalia smiled, "Good." she said, glad to see that she was at least eating properly even if it wasdue to extreme hunger. Rifana had spent most of her day riding on Trystan or Isis while nibbling on something or the other but she knew how easy it was to get hungry again when leveling up rapidly.

"Father!" she heard Isis say urgently, "someone _really _strong is coming closer!"

Mr Adrian stood up immediately, absorbing his food and releasing the Disc in a single smooth motion. Raphtalia picked up Rifana, the sudden movement dislodging her grip on the plate she was holding which made her cry out a little before she stifled the protest, and jumped onto the Disc.

Mr Adrian, Trystan and Isis joined her and they were above the forest floor in seconds.

"Direction?" asked Mr Adrian.

"There!" said Isis pointing East, "they're really far away but I can still feelthem. Their mana is a _lot_ stronger than your father."

Adrian quickly prepared a dozen floating swords and closed his eyes before opening them and focusing on the direction that Isis had pointed out.

"They're close," said Isis. Making Raphtalia tense up. Her grip tightened on her sword.

And then they all heard Mr Adrian laugh, it was not a happy laugh, more like he had been shocked by something. They all blinked when the disc started to descend.

"Father?" asked Isis urgently, "What is it?"

"There is a very, very powerful Filolial Queen coming to meet us," he said, his expression very serious, "running is unnecessary _and _pointless. Let's all be polite okay?"

All of them nodded hesitantly, his voice had been very firm and _very scared_ as he said his last sentence. As they returned to camp Raphtalia began to wonder just how _powerful _and dangerous this person must be to scare Mr Adrian.


	25. Chapter 25

_Adrian _

Adrian wanted to run. He wanted to blast the Filolial that was casually making her way to him into oblivion. He craved to do _something _other than wait for her to arrive and cast judgement upon him but there was nothingthat he could think of.

Adrian had expected to meet Fitoria sooner or later. Indeed he had decided to raise his Filolials with the expectation that it would gain him some degree of positive influence over her. However, he had not anticipated meeting her so soon. In the light novels, it had taken her monthsfor her to bother meeting Naofumi and that had only been because the Heroes hadn't done anything about the Waves internationally for months and because he was raising a Filolial. Adrian had expected that he would at least be powerful enough to run away from her by the time they met.

He sighed, disposed of all his plans regarding the Filolial Queen, and took a deep breath. Adrian was seated alongside the rest of his party, there was no point in preparing to run, not from this bird. He tried to keep himself calm, he didn't know enough to worry or relax, he needed to stay calm and focused and try his best to be diplomatic. Sure Fitoria was a dangerous entity, but that didn't mean that she was a danger to him _right now._ He just needed to play his cards right...and hope that he didn't piss her off.

It didn't take her long to arrive.

"Greetings, Sword Hero," she said, upon reaching the clearing they were in, "I am Fitoria, Queen of all Filolials and I would like to speak to you about something very important."

Adrian stood up, his party followed his lead, he nodded at the giant bird, "I see," he said, "It's good to meet you Fitoria. I'm Adrian Black and these are my party members." he winced at how stiff he was sounding, though Fitoria didn't seem to find anything amiss. Was she just that unused to socializing...or did she simply not care?

Adrian took a moment to introduce them one by one. He noted that she almost ignored Raphtalia and Rifana, though she was fairly polite, but her eyes lingered on Isis and Trystan.

"Please take a seat," he said, indicating a chair that he had drawn out from his sword.

The bird nodded before closing her eyes and drawing her wings around herself. An instant later she had transformed into a silver-haired, white-winged girl that looked a _lot _like Isis. Though his daughter had slightly longer hair. Adrian quickly compared the two and found that he would believe it if someone told him that they were sisters.

"Thank you," she said politely, then her tone changed to something more serious, "Sword Hero do you intend to fight the Waves?"

Adrian raised an eyebrow at how direct she was being but nodded, "I do. I'm training right now and have already registered for the one in Melromarc and I plan to synchronize with the remaining Hourglasses over the next month or so once I'm confident that the human and demi-human governments can't get in my way."

She nodded looking a bit annoyed and Adrian was struck with the memory of his siblings trying to act like doctors and policemen in their games. Was this whole thing just a game to her? He scoffed at the image and then found himself sobering up as he imagined his siblings with the power to wreck a city...the idea of a super-powerful child was strangely terrifying.

"Good," she said and turned her attention to the two Filolials, "You have raised two Royal Filolials. I wish to test them."

Adrian found it rather refreshing that she didn't bother with small talk but it was rather jarring to just have her go from one topic to the next without explanation or reason.

"Please wait for a second," he said, "Just _who _are you and why are you concerned with whether or not I fight the waves?"

She tilted her head before responding without delay, "I am Fitoria and the Heroes _must _fight the waves so I asked you to make sure."

Adrian started to wonder if this girl was toying with him or if she was just this obtuse.

Still, she had given him an opening, "The help menu I have suggests the same, but why _must _the Heroes fight the waves anyway? I mean sure I'm going to so that I can reduce the damage that the Wave does but I doubt whatever system managed to create these weapons and summon me here cares about that."

Fitoria nodded, her voice turning a little bit more menacing than before, "The Heroes defend the world," she said, "if a Hero defeats the wave then it delays the next wave."

Adrian frowned at that fact, he had assumed that the Heroes had some sort of passive effect given what he had remembered from the Light Novel he had read. Something about the Waves getting worse if a Hero died. Was the Light Novel wrong? Perhaps a mistranslation _or_ were both effects real? Best to check.

"I see," he said, "in that case why do we have _four _heroes? Wouldn't just one suffice to defeat the waves?"

Adrian was being a little indirect, he wanted Fitoria to spill out a few more pieces of information and _really _didn't want to hint that he knew that she would kill the heroes if they were incompetent. Plus, it was something he was curious about.

She shook her head, "All four heroes are needed," she said firmly, "If even one Hero dies then the waves get worse."

"So the heroes as a whole passively defend the world along with the active effects of defeating the Wave?" he asked.

"Yes," she said with a nod.

Adrian wanted to curse at this fact, Fitoria didn't seem to wish to openly threaten him at this point but the possibility loomed over his head. If the Four Heroes didn't play along she had plenty of reason to want to kill him. His plans to defeat or pacify Fitoria just went up on his priority list. At this point, Adrian was quite certain that he could deal with most countries. As long as he was on the move and had the initiative he could hold the advantage and later on once he had more time and resources he could look into other means of power projection.

"Very well," he said, flicking his head towards his filolials "and _why _do you wish to test them?"

For the first time since the conversation started Fitoria hesitated for a bit, "I wish to test their capabilities to succeed me." she admitted.

"Succeed you?" he repeated before asking, "what exactly is your role and what do you want from them?"

"I must protect the world," she said, "I fight the waves in places where humans and demi-humans don't stay."

He frowned, he had known about her so-called duty but the idea of her dumping her responsibilities on _his _children was grating. He hesitated for a little bit but choose to question her, he was scared of this woman but that didn't mean the was willing to just let do whatever she wanted.

"Are you _forced _to protect the world?" he asked, "will they be forced to fight as well if you approve of them?"

Adrian was pretty certain that they wouldn't be but it would be wise to see her response even if he couldn't trust her answer. Especially since he could see her hesitating at his question. Was she surprised that he wouldn't just let her fight his Filolials?

"I am not forced to fight," she said, her tone slightly puzzled at something, "I promised the Hero who raised me that I would protect the world and _that's _why I fight."

Adrian stared at her just admitting the fact that she was insanely old when she hadn't mentioned it before he had assumed that she didn't want to say anything about it

"Just how old are you?" he asked, "The last time the heroes were summoned was nearly two centuries in the past."

It was a little rude to ask such a question outright but Fitoria only shrugged, "I was raised a long time ago." she said, "but it was long before the last set of heroes were summoned."

"Then do you know how the waves got started?" he asked, genuinely curious, "Or what they are exactly? I find it _very _unlikely that they are normal natural disasters when there is a system in place to counter them that was not made by the people of the world."

"The waves started long before my time," she said and shook her head, "I don't know much about them and I have forgotten a lot but I remember that only the heroes can save the people from the Waves."

"Which is why you wanted to make sure that I would fight," he said, completing her sentence, she nodded in response. He continued, "Do you want Trystan and Isis to help you with the Waves outside of civilization?"

He was pretty sure she didn't but Adrian had never fully figured out just _why _she had waited until Filo to find a successor. She had been alive for generations it should have been easy for her to convince a Hero to hatch a Filolial and then raise said Filolial into a successor. Had she had successors before? And did she get them killed or kill them? It was grating to think that he would have to stand aside if she forced the issue...but refusing could be a good test of how far she would go he doubted that she would kill him. Then again there was a pretty good reason to allow her to select one or both of his Filolials as her heir as it would allow for that special Class Up.

She shook her head, "No." she said simply, "I only want to have a successor for the future."

Then she turned to his Filolials who had been silently watching their conversation, "If I consider you worthy I shall give you a power-up so that you can protect your Hero."

Adrian felt a surge of irritation as Isis sat up, focused rather than worried, and Trystan stood up and said, "Awesome, can we learn how to fly? Big Bro is always flying around…"

Fitoria smiled at his innocent question and his rambling explanation but said nothing and just turned towards the Sword Hero. Adrian frowned and reiterated his previous concern, "You haven't told me _why _you need a successor," he pointed out, "from what you said you've been alive for a long time I doubt that age is a problem."

"That doesn't mean that I can't die," she said simply.

"So it's just insurance?" he asked, annoyed that he couldn't figure out if she was lying and that _he couldn't _press her for details.

She nodded and he sighed.

"What do you two think?" he asked, "want to try it?"

Trystan's answer was immediate and positive but Isis was more contemplative.

"What sort of test?" asked Isis looking Fitoria straight in the eye.

Fitoria tilted her head before she said, "A fight. You two versus me."

"You got it!" exclaimed Trystan.

"You are much stronger than us," said Isis and silencing her brother with a glare, "we can't beat you. Even Father would struggle to beat you."

Adrian wanted to wince at her estimate. He hoped that she was _overestimating him_. It would not even well for her if she was underestimating Fitoria.

Fitoria smiled, "You don't have to win...but you can't lose either," she said.

Adrian frowned once he realized that she didn't care for much else. Her only goal had been to test his Filolials. Checking to make sure that he fought the wave had probably been incidental.

Isis considered Fitoria and agreed. She then looked to him for advice while Fitoria got up from her chair and moved a fair distance away after transforming into her Filolial Queen form. Her size was pretty much the same as Trystan.

"Go all out and be _careful._" he told them both, "And make sure to work together, it's one of the few advantages that you have."

They both nodded and he made sure to pat their heads before he said, "Good luck."

They nodded again and Isis jumped onto Trystan's back before they got into a position opposite to fitoria. Adrian tried to suppress his nervousness.

He failed.

It was unnerving to realize that despite all the power he had gained since he had entered this new world at this moment he was utterly powerless.

Adrian didn't think that Fitoria would permanently harm Isis or Trystan. She might be a little rough with them but if she granted them her blessing then it would be beneficial in the long run. Even if she _didn't _bless them or care about them it was unlikely that she would want to anger him, not because he could kill her - he couldn't, but because she _wanted _him to fight the waves and he was unlikely to if she killed someone he cared for. And Adrian did believe that she cared about them, as far as he could tell it was the only reason she had come to visit.

Still, watching Fitoria set up a barrier and then stand in her Filolial form waiting for Trystan and Isis to start was terrifying. Adrian had his sensory skills at the ready, he was using _Dash _to enhance his perception and would manifest his Swords if he thought that his Filolials were at risk. He was as ready as he could be, everything from his Sword Form to his Status enchantment was optimized.

It was a pity that he had _no goddamn idea what to do._

If Fitoria turned out to be hostile, if this was just a game that the ageless bird was playing, then they were all _dead._ No questions asked. Zero chance of survival. Adrian was _almost _sure that she didn't want to hurt them but _almost _wasn't good enough when his life was at risk, when the lives of his _party members _were at risk.

"Please start whenever you're ready," said Fitoria, her voice calm, but he could hear an undertone of excitement.

To his surprise, it was Trystan who made the first move.

"I, who has contemplated the source of all power, command you! Bless us with greater power! Zuerst Strength! Zuerst Speed! Zuerst Guard!" he chanted, and Adrian noted that both Isis and Trystan were surrounded by a pale blue aura, the colour of Trystan's magic.

Fitoria didn't move. He wasn't surprised. Stat boosts or not his filolials were no match for the Queen.

Trystan kept his distance staring warily at Fitoria, he wasn't doing anything to attack, Isis had taken up that role. She was whispering, _chanting, _and while he couldn't hear _what _she was saying the effects of her chanting was obvious. A massive amount of lightning was gathering around her fingertips.

"Zweit Lightning Blast," she said, her voice barely audible over the crackling of lightning, as it moved towards Fitoria at incredible speed. Adrian could track it, and it was clear that Lightning Magic _didn't _move as fast as natural lightning, but it was still insanely fast.

Fitoria batted the attack away with a Wing and then vanished in a blur.

Adrian saw how she leisurely ran towards Trystan and Isis, moving at incredible speeds with absolute ease, and then used the same wing that she had employed to stop Isis' attack to slam into Trystan. The attack was casual but the effects were incredible. Trystan went flying, Isis had to hold on desperately to stay on his back, and though the hit was glancing thanks to Trystan leaning away at the last moment Adrian could see the bruises forming thanks to his _Blindsight._

Trystan landed on his feet thanks to Isis using a burst of wind to slow their movement. He winced and cast a healing spell on himself, Adrian frowned when Fitoria allowed it, just as she allowed Isis to prepare her next spell.

Fitoria was toying with them.

It was what he had expected to see but it still frustrated and infuriated him to watch it happen. Fitoria casually negated Isis' wind spell and then fired off a massive cyclone at the two Filolials.

"_Barrier" _yelled Trystan, desperate to stop the massive attack. A series of magical floating walls emerged from nothing and the first three shattered without trouble.

The last one survived. Isis had reinforced it with Lightning Magic and had changed it to a simple, transparent plane to a crackling barrier with bolts of lightning jumping out from it. Adrian had _no idea _how the hell it worked but it seemed to have surprised Fitoria a fair amount. For the first time, he could tell that she was a little bit taken aback.

"Make _more," _commanded Isis, and Trystan obeyed even as they moved back to create some distance, dozens of barriers were created which Isis quickly converted into the Lightning variant which moved forward to surround Fitoria. The Filolial casually dodged a few of them, ignoring the sparks that jumped to her and transformed into her human form, making it _even harder _to trap.

But she was still very casual in her movements. It was unnerving to realize that she was barely even trying. Was this how Raphtalia felt when she saw him fight? It would explain the looks of fear he occasionally received from her after he killed some monster.

Thankfully his Filolials had not stayed idle during this time.

Isis had prepared a massive spell, some sort of combination that had both Wind and Fire mana included, while Trystan got buffs ready again.

The massive blast of fire hit Fitoria head-on. It looked incredibly impressive, the soil around their feet burned to ash in seconds, nearby trees caught fire. Even better the hit was a direct strike and the Barrier around Fitoria seemed to contain and amplify the massive flare.

_Blindsight _neatly shattered any hope he had of the attack doing _something_. Fitoria has employed a barrier of her own that casually blocked the attack. When the flames subsided, Isis was panting heavily while Fitoria was standing there in her pink and white dress, looking as pristine as always. When Isis and Trystan caught sight of her being unharmed they were a little shocked but they quickly began to prepare another attack.

Fitoria didn't let them do so this time. Instead, she pressed them, not enough to crush them as she surely could, but enough that they didn't have the time to prepare a combination like the Lightning Barriers or a massive attack like Isis' flame blast.

Adrian felt his Sword transform as he watched her send a massive wind burst that sent Trystan and Isis flying. He grit his teeth took a deep breath and reminded himself of the fact that _she didn't want them dead. _He _knew _that they would already be dead if she did.

His anger and fear didn't fade even as he transformed his Sword back to one with a good speed boost.

Isis got up, on the ground for the first time in this battle and covered herself in lightning before beginning to chant. Adrian frowned, curious, he had never seen her do something like this before. A secret? Or was it a last-ditch effort to do _something?_

Fitoria approached Isis with incredible speed that Adrian could track but Isis couldn't. The older Filolial raised her hand to attack when a truly massive blast of lightning blasted the Filolial. Adrian blinked, trying to get rid of the spots in his eyes, even as he used _Blindsight _to track the battle.

Isis had surprised Fitoria and Trystan didn't let the opportunity go to waste. He charged Fitoria and kicked her with his full force. It was probably the only time either of his Filolials had managed to hit her head on and Trystan was buffed and had used his full force. The ground underneath Fitoria cracked and a great deal of soil and dust were kicked up.

Fitoria barely even moved and was almost completely undamaged. Her expression was satisfied. She waved her hand and dispersed both the barrier surrounding the battlefield and the dust around the three of them. The smouldering trees and the heated ground were quickly cooled down.

She smiled at Isis and Trystan and said, "Well done,"

Adrian relaxed a little, just noticing how tense he had been, how quickly his heart had been beating. He loosened his grip on the hilt of his sword and changed the hand he had been holding it before wincing at the pain as he clenched his fist and relaxed it.

He shook his head, realizing that this had been the most terrifying thing he had faced in this world. Adrian took a deep breath and wondered why nothing else, not being summoned, not even being chased by three spies or assaulting Rabier and eventually killing him had unnerved him as much as a battle that had carried minimal risk of death or damage. Hell, had they failed to take out those three spies or Rabier the best-case scenario would have been death, this was _nothing _in comparison.

Adrian walked towards them. Raphtalia and Rifana followed the latter clenching onto the former's hand tightly, in awe of the fight she had just seen. Isis and Trystan had relaxed and Fitoria was healing them.

When he reached them he ignored Fitoria, unsure if he'd be in control if he spoke to her, knelt and hugged Isis and then got up and stroked Trystan's head, both of them were tired and didn't respond much beyond a smile but he _needed _to feel that they were alive. His eyes and _Blindsight _suggested that they were fine but it had been horrible to just _stand aside _as they were toyed with.

"You both okay?" he asked, wondering what the limits of _Blindsight _and his _Diagnosis _skills were. Could he have missed something subtle? Perhaps some type of small problem that only becomes a problem in the long run? He didn't think they had been injured this badly since they had been born.

They nodded, tired but otherwise intact.

"Sword Hero," said Fitoria, "you have raised two excellent Filolials,"

He looked to her, trying to keep himself under control, "Thank you but they have a _lot _to learn. Though given that they're less than a week old, there is no doubt that they are amazing."

She smiled, it was a guileless smile, and it was with surprise that he realized that Fitoria _wasn't _very manipulative or cruel...she was just insanely blunt. She'd totally missed his anger and fear. Perhaps it was a sign of her age and extreme power. If she wanted something there was literally no one, no _nation, _who could hope to deny her.

Fitoria turned towards the Filolials and said, "I declare both of you as my potential heirs, the one who displays greater growth and wisdom shall be my _true _successor." Her tone was rather...stiff, formal in a way that seemed almost comical.

The way her terrifying large and well-controlled mana unfurled as she manifested two crowns and placed levitated them so that they landed on his Filolials was a wonderful reminder of why _he didn't dare oppose her._ For now.

The Crowns vanished in a flare of light and Adrian frowned as he pulled up their stats and noted that they had been boosted all around, some stats more than others but a general boost. It was around a fifty per cent boost at a minimum and a nearly _300% per cent_ boost for Isis' magic stats. It would seem that the magnitude of the boost was dependant upon their specializations. Adrian wondered if this was worth the fight and fear.

He cut down on his silly thought. A minor annoyance in the short term for a long term boost was an _excellent exchange. _Sentiment had no place here, this alone, even without the Class Up boost, was worthwhile. Adrian knew that he needed to calm down. He had never enjoyed being helpless, being _powerless_. Fitoria probably didn't give a shit about him, he had to stop assuming that she was going to just turn into her Kaiju Form and stomp him into paste without reason ...then again if she believed that killing him was worthwhile she _would _crush him and _he _didn't have to be the reason, if the other Heroes were morons it would be his head on the line...he would have to look into controlling the other heroes. He would _not _die for their stupidity.

Once she had finished with the Filolials she turned to him, "Sword Hero," she said, plucking out a strand of her hair, "this will grant you all the Filolial series swords."

Adrian held up his Sword and she dropped it onto the gemstone. He blinked in surprise as _dozens _of Swords were immediately unlocked...and the result was that the stats of his Filolials ended up _skyrocketing. _There were a lot of boosts to their stats, skills and other parameters.

"Thank you," he said, meaning it, she had just boosted the chances of their survival manifold...and given him a lot of incentive to create an army of Royal Filolials. He wondered if she had planned that.

She smiled and nodded and then started to transform into her Filolial form, clearly preparing to leave and normally he would be glad to leave it at that...but he could see now that his assumptions about her had been born out of fear, she was a hell of a lot more predictable than he had assumed and he _needed _a good rapport with her given that he would probably _never _be able to match her in combat.

"Fitoria," he asked, "Would you like to have dinner with us? I have an idea I'd like to propose and I'd like to thank you more concretely than just through words."

She hesitated but a look back at camp, where a massive pile of food was laid out, covered up but still fragrant, seemed to convince her to stay. Fitoria nodded, "Alright," she said and transformed back into her human form.

He smiled, reminded himself to treat her like an Isis who wanted lesser affection and _not like a goddess out to destroy him, _and said, "Is there something in particular that you'd like to eat?"

Her tilted head and contemplative look just reinforced his impression of her. She was surprisingly childlike in a lot of ways. And _that _could be used...he could only hope that she didn't kill him if she realized what he was doing but he had just realized that he _needed _to deal with her, he needed her to realize that he was a _person _who was trying not just something she had to deal with as a part of her duty and there was no way to do that without taking some risks. Hopefully, she was in a good mood after finding two successors.

Fitoria ate dinner with gusto. It was odd to realize that his decision to invite her to dinner might have been the best possible move he could have made.

She was sitting next to Isis and Trystan and was eagerly comparing different dishes. The dinner was simple but he had made a large variety of things to eat rather than a large amount of a single choice. Normally he would not bother with such a thing as it was inefficient. It took almost the same amount of time whether he cooked 1 kg of one type of food or 100kg of the same, but making _different _options took a lot more time. Thankfully, he had several types of prepared variants stored in his Sword and he had used a fair number of them. It was absurd and wonderful that storing food didn't harm it in anyway. It was just as delicious and tasty as if it had _just _been created.

His little tactic had worked well and Fitoria was clearly enjoying her meal. Adrian had to wonder if she had eaten cooked food recently. He knew that Filolials _could _eat uncooked meals of a very, very broad variety so she might have had just been eating things raw...if she needed to eat at all. After all, he didn't understand the nature of her immortality, it would be unwise of him to assume that she _needed _to eat.

Honestly, watching her eat her food messily, try to make sure that _she _got most if not all of her favourite dishes and slowly try out every dish before rapidly consuming it if she liked it before asking for seconds, made Adrian realize, yet again, that she wasn't _just _a Goddess who could kill him, she was a person. And just like any other person she was flawed and broken in more ways than one. In fact, her millennia-long lifespan had probably helped her _stack up _on flaws.

Still, all this went a long way to reassure him that getting to know her was a pretty decent move. Though there were some risks, it was good to see that he was successfully minimizing them...assuming that she didn't find his request to be problematic.

Dinner went on for a while with Trystan and Fitoria getting into an unacknowledged contest where they each tried to eat faster and faster. But eventually, it ended and Fitoria walked up to him as he was putting away the dishes and absorbing all the leftovers.

"What did you want to speak about?" she asked bluntly.

Adrian turned to her and then drew out a small cloth from his sword before saying, "You've got some stains here," he said handing her the cloth as he pointed at his chin.

She blinked but took the cloth and wiped her face properly. He waited until she was done and was looking at him expectantly before starting.

"I wanted your supervision while fighting a Wave that you normally deal with," he said, before clarifying at her confused expression, "You said that you deal with the waves away from civilization right? I'd like to have a...trial run you could say, where the only problem with not suppressing the wave is a few more monsters added to an area which can be either dealt with later or by you. What do you think?"

"Trial Run?" she mumbled, even more confused, "Why? You're strong enough to defeat these initial waves."

"It's nice to know that but it's not a matter of power," he admitted, "but I want to make sure that I have a good set of tactics in mind when I'm dealing with a Wave in a populated region. I'd rather make mistakes when I'm an area that is not populated. In exchange for this one time favour I'll take over that Hourglass, it'll be my duty to deal with it from now onwards _if _that's alright with you."

She tilted her head, "There is a Wave that will start in four days. You can fight it if you want." she said with a shrug, completely apathetic.

Adrian raised an eyebrow, wasn't she devoted to _fighting _the waves? Or was it simply that he was a Hero and his volunteering for this was a positive? He needed to know more about this girl. It was seriously unnerving that one of the few people in the world he could _never _surpass was so...odd and difficult to predict.

"I'd like that...assuming that you're willing to back us up if need be," he said, four days was a little earlier than he had anticipated, enough to get his party to level 50 sure, but not much more than that.

"Back you up?" she asked.

"Help us survive if we are overwhelmed," he clarified, "We'd probably be fine but I'd like some guarantee and your help is the best security we can get."

She snorted dismissively, "You're strong enough to defeat the wave you don't need my help." she said, waving her hand, "I'll take you to the Hourglass and help you Class Up your party but you won't need anything else."

He sighed, "You're probably right," he admitted, "but I'd like to have you around just in case, it'll only be for the first wave and you'll _never _have to deal with this hourglass' wave again. Please."

It grated on him to _beg _for her aid but if she agreed, for whatever reason, he would have guaranteed his survival and that of his party with no questions asked. Adrian had already fought the monsters around the Seaetto Region and found that even those which had emerged from the Wave to be weaker than those from the Dragon Territory. Frankly, he wasn't worried about any individual monster from the Wave, save for the Wave Boss. What he was worried about was the fact that they would be facing down a _horde _of monsters. He didn't know how well coordinated they were, what area they would be unleashed at _or _what sort of strength maxima he could expect.

Fitoria was terrifyingly strong and a horrifying enemy to have...but she was also the _best _possible backup. It was a pity that she looked annoyed at his request. Probably pissed off that he was making her attend _despite _the fact that he was going to deal with the wave.

She folded her arms and thought about it for a moment before nodding, "Fine," she said, "I'll take you to the Hourglass."

Adrian smiled, "Thank you very much," he said, "I appreciate this Fitoria."

She nodded and then closed her eyes, everyone around them, who had been listening to our conversation even as they packed up the camp had to cover their eyes as a glowing carriage just _appeared _in the middle of the clearing.

It was a beautiful blue carriage. The interior looked exquisitely designed and it looked like it was made for _Royalty._ Fitting that it belonged to the Queen of All Filolials but more than incredible design it was the _gemstone _embedded in it that drew his eye. The blue coloured gemstone had the same look under _Mana sight _that gem in Adrian sword did.

She could have a weapon just like he did. That had some very interesting implications...he would have to see if he could get Isis or Trystan a weapon of their own.

"Let's go," she said, pointing at her Carriage, "It won't take us long to get to the Hourglass."

"Cool!" said Trystan, sounding incredibly excited, "Can I pull it? Please!"

"No," said Fitoria sharply, "It's my carriage,"

Adrian stared at the girl who _actually _looked annoyed for the first time and decided that he may as well ask, "Is that Carriage like my Sword? As in only one person can use it?"

It would explain why she didn't bother with a weapon _and _why she was so ridiculously strong. He hadn't expected that he would get an opening to ask her what it was so soon. He'd have to thank Trystan later.

Adrian half expected her to lie or deflect but she just nodded and then guided them into the comfortable carriage. To his surprise, she sat with them and simply said, "Portal," before telling them to walk out but Adrian didn't need to walk out to notice that they were already near the Hourglass nor that they were nowhere near the forest they had been in. _Blindsight _and the _Map _Sword confirmed his suspicions. He was _thousands _of kilometres away from Melromarc. It was both relieving and terrifying. He needed to get the Portal Sword.

The area they had shown up in was a massive plateau surrounded by mountains on all sides. The ruins that populated the Plateau were massive and surprisingly intact but what struck him most was the sheer number of monsters in the area. There were hundreds but other than that the river, natural defences and excellent soil marked this area as a truly excellent place to live. Adrian wondered why this place had been abandoned but shrugged it off. There were simply _too _many possibilities, though a war was the most likely option.

Adrian used a Thousand Sword Skill to clear out the ruins, and they moved towards the large central structure, probably a temple or a palace that housed the Hourglass. Raphtalia, Rifana and the Filolials were looking around like a bunch of tourists but once they arrived at the Hourglass they went silent.

"Time to get you all Classed Up," he said, feeling a thrill of satisfaction. He no longer had to worry about Cal Mira, at least not for the moment, and probably not ever.

This had been a surprisingly good day despite the horrible start. He watched on with a smile as his party Classed Up, ignored the bright light from the Hourglass, and felt immense satisfaction as they had their stats _doubled _in an instant_._


	26. Chapter 26

_**Bellamy **_

Bellamy winced with every step he took through uneven terrain, his legs were aching fiercely after trekking through the Dragon Infested region for several hours, but tried not to let it show on his face. He knew that the entire team he was travelling with was likely to be in the same condition, though the Classed Up members likely had it easier, and didn't want to drop morale.

Bellamy and fifteen other members of the Church were on the trail of Sir Adrian. It had taken them days to get a start, another couple of days to move through the forest itself _and _despite finding several traces of his presence they had no real idea how close or how far they were to him. Frankly, the simple fact that they _knew _that he had been here was more than what they had had before so he wasn't exactly _unhappy _about their progress but it was still frustrating to be on the trail for a moving target. Bellamy was not a hunter, he lacked the patience to simply keep following the trail when it could potentially lead to _nothing. _Not when Sir Adrian could be at risk.

He still felt his fury rise as he remembered just _why _Sir Adrian had been forced to leave and that he had been forced to just _allow _that piece of scum to go ahead and corrupt the Spear Hero soon after. Bellamy promised himself that one day he _would _ensure that the Princess was punished for her sins. Not only had she accused Sir Adrian of rape, compelling him to escape Melromarc and take unnecessary risks with his life, but she had then used that pathetic sob story to turn both the King _and _the Spear Hero against him. Even now it was only due to the fastidious efforts of both the Queen, the Guild _and _the Pope that Sir Adrian didn't have a bounty on his head. The whole situation was disgusting. Not only had they ceased to aid the Legendary Hero, but they had also actively started to _act against him_. The very thought was blasphemous. Though even worse was how the Pope had reacted to these events.

Bellamy tried _not _to glare at the kill squad around him. To be certain their main role was to track Sir Adrian down and offer their aid to him. To serve him as was right...but Father Andrew had revealed the true reason why their squad had so many people when a smaller number would move faster. If the Sword Hero was not amenable to returning then they were to kill him or capture him.

The thought made him utterly furious. His rage was only mitigated by one simple fact: The Sword Hero would kill them _all _if they tried to force him into anything. None of these people had seen his truly insane growth, none of them realized that while their squad had _struggled _to move through the Dragon Territory at a decent rate Sir Adrian had _slaughtered what_ appeared to be tens of thousands of monsters. By now he must be at level 40 at the very least and given how disproportionate the strength of the Legendary Hero was with respect to his level Bellamy had no doubt of Sir Adrian's power.

Still, Bellamy hoped that diplomacy would prevail. Sir Adrian had not had enough time to realize that the Church was quite separate from the Royal Family and that _they _not the Queen were the true power in the nation. Surely, if he had but known that simple fact, Sir Adrian would have approached him when he had realized that Princess Malty planned to accuse him of rape. It was disappointing to realize that Sir Adrian had never realized just how much influence he had in the Church. Bellamy was certain that Father Andrew and Sir Adrian together could have solved _all their problems _with ease. Now it was his job as the only trustworthy party member of Sir Adrian to support the Hero.

"Drakon up ahead," came the call from the scouts in front, both nuns who were standing there were long-range sensors, they both followed the trail of destruction that Sir Adrian had left _and _ensured that they carefully avoided all the ludicrously powerful monsters in the area. Certainly, their team could defeat any individual monster, but if they got bogged down in combat, eventually even all the level 60's that they were travelling with would end up dead. Truthfully, Bellamy, as an individual who had yet to Class Up, had no place here, in an area where the recommended _starting _level was nearly level 50, but even the Pope had acknowledged that he was their best chance of ensuring Sir Adrian return.

Bellamy kept his breathing in order as they moved around the Drakon as carefully as possible. The sensors and the long-range attackers, Bellamy included, carefully keeping their attacks ready in case the powerful beast managed to track them down. It was a wise precaution, more than once before, they had been attacked by a monster they had assumed to have avoided. Bellamy sent a silent prayer for Atlanta, a nun, whom they had lost yesterday.

This time however they were fortunate, the Drakon ignored them entirely, and they continued their search.

It didn't take them long to reach a scene of absolute devastation. Bellamy carefully ignored the gasp from one of his fellow soldiers.

Bellamy activated his spell with a quick chant and instantly grasped everything within 300 meters that had light fall on it, this information combined with what his eyes could see allowed him to realize just how powerful an opponent Sir Adrian must have faced to cause _this _much damage.

Dozens of trees had been reduced to splinters, the ground had massive arcs carved into it, and Bellamy could see the area where the soil had been burnt, melted and then _blasted _for good measure. The whole area was _saturated _with the lingering remnants of Sir Adrian's power and it was eerie to note that even the monsters had avoided the area.

"What in God's name happened _here?" _asked Matthew, the leader of their explanation, the man turned to him in an instant before asking rudely, "Bellamy, did the Sword Hero do this?" disbelief was thick in his voice.

Bellamy kept his sneer contained, "It would seem so sir." he said politely.

"You didn't say _anything _about the Hero being this strong," the man accused, fear dripping of his tone. Bellamy wanted to smile at the man's realization that his target was _not someone whom he could kill_. The vindication was quite sweet.

"He wasn't before sir," said Bellamy, honest but feeling quite smug, "However as was noted in my report Sir Adrian reached level 32 in merely four days of activity. It is quite likely that his power has only risen since then."

It was an incredibly obvious statement. The incredible number of traces of dead monsters that they had witnessed in _Dragon Territory _should have hinted at the ludicrous amount of power at the Sword Hero's disposal, had none of them realized how strong he would have to be to survive _alone _in this area?

Sir Matthew nodded, though it was stiff. The man gazed around the massive area that had been devastated with a blank look on his face before turning to the trackers and barking, "Do you have the trail?"

At their positive response, he called for restarting their journey. It was a foolish decision but he could understand their fear of this place. Bellamy found it a comforting reminder that Sir Adrian was still alive and well _and _growing in strength even when he lacked any form of support but these blasphemous fools saw it as a sign of their mission's inevitable failure unless _Bellamy _convinced the Sword Hero to return.

Bellamy tried not to let his smile show. It was quite a satisfying feeling he had right now. Then he shook off his foolish thoughts. He still had a job to do. He could not afford to relax until he was _sure _that the Sword Hero was alive and well. It was his duty, he could do no less.


	27. Chapter 27

_**Naofumi **_

They were nearly a day's worth of travel from Van Reichnott's home when they decided to take a small break. Naofumi was more than happy to relax a little bit and start cooking the meat they had harvested from the monsters that they had hunted and he could see that both Ethan and Fenral were looking forward to their meals.

For the dragon he didn't do anything very fancy, just som grilled meat with a couple of spices that he had picked up while on their travels, but for himself and Ethan he made something a little more complex carefully roasting the meat and making sure to use the bread they had received from the nearby village to add a bit of texture. It wasn't anywhere near the best he could make but it was pretty decent for food made around a campfire.

"Thank you," said the adventurer, as Naofumi handed over Ethan's share of the meal. Fenral also growled his thanks when Naofumi offered the Flying Dragon his own share. Neither of them waited long, Fenral immediately started eating while Ethan made sure that Naofumi had started to consume his food before doing the same. It was quite flattering to see them eat with such gusto.

It had been nearly two weeks since his summoning into this new world and it still amazed him just how awe-inspiring this world could be. Massive monsters that he fought, magic and even a magical superweapon that he had stuck to his arm. All of it was truly incredible. Honestly Naofumi felt a little bad for thinking ill of his Shield on the first day, sure he couldn't attack _at all _and it was a little annoying to realize that while he had gained some level of superhuman strength he _still _couldn't hurt someone even if he punched them in the face, but the incredible defensive capabilities that he gained as a trade-off was worth it. Naofumi had been unharmed no matter what he faced down.

Just recently a small village had been having some trouble with some sort of weird Chimaera. Naofumi had decided to help them out a bit while continuing his training and so he had tracked the monster down with Ethan's help. The fight had been a bit difficult, the monster had enough defence that Ethan's magic had struggled to kill it, but eventually, they _had _taken it down, even if it had been tedious. During that fight Naofumi had gotten hit directly numerous times but despite taking hits that would have probably _killed _most people in this world and would have _definitely _killed a bloody elephant back in his world, he hadn't been damaged at all.

And he was just level 32. Ethan had told him that his defence stat was about the same as Edgar, who was at _level 90._ It was kind of nuts. Naofumi had met the guild leader and he had gotten the feeling that the man had been some sort of War veteran, the fact that it had taken Naofumi two weeks to catch up to him as far as defense was concerned was a damn good demonstration of how absurdly powerful his Shield was.

Still, his lack of attack was a serious drawback even if his defense was amazing. He couldn't help but wonder if the other Heroes were _even _stronger than this. Their defence wasn't likely to be as strong as his, he _was _the Shield Hero, but if their attack was as high as his defence then he could see _why _this country only worshipped them. Sure as the Shield Hero he could block _anything _once he was fully leveled up but any of the other Heroes could actually _fight _properly with the same level of power directed at their attack stat, it was probably a lot more epic. Over time those epic shows of power were probably remembered a hell of a lot better than a Shield Hero _not dying._

"Naofumi," said Ethan, "we should take a moment to talk about the representatives."

Naofumi frowned at his tired tone, "What about them?" he asked, wondering what _else _there was to say. Ethan and Edgar had given him the basics on day one and since then the older man had made it a point to teach him about the very messy politics that was present in this world. Siltvelt had been a pretty important part of those lectures and he certainly wasn't ignorant about them.

Still, the man's tone made him wary.

Ethan sighed, "Most of these reps will want one thing and one thing only. For the Shield Hero to join their nations." he said, Naofumi nodded along, this wasn't news to him, "but Siltvelt, in particular, is of significant concern because no matter what you choose there will be significant risks,"

Naofumi frowned, that _was _new. Ethan had been fairly open about the facts about both Melromarc _and _Siltvelt. His description of both nations being extremists on opposite sides of the spectrum had probably _not _been what Edgar would have preferred for him to say but the adventurer was a pretty honest guy. Ethan had not been flattering about either nation but had asked him to consider staying in Melromarc simply because it had the best chance of avoiding war _and _would ensure that he was both free to gain strength and stay safe. And until now his predictions had come true. Sure the King had been quite annoying in the beginning but even if the guy didn't like the Shield Hero or Demi-humans the _only _thing that the old fool had done was stop him from getting a party member at the same time as the others. Hardly a massive crime, hell, it was nothing more than a petty annoyance at best.

Siltvelt, on the other hand, felt like it would be both paradise _and _hell at the same time. He would be worshipped _and _used by those in power and Naofumi wasn't certain that he wanted _either _thing to happen.

"What _exactly _do you mean by risky?" he asked.

"If you accept then it should be mostly fine...though you know the risks," he said and Naofumi nodded, worship from the masses at the cost of manipulation by those in power, "but if you refuse then they'll likely consider you a false Hero, a false _God _and that might bring in some pretty extreme factions from Siltvelt into the game. They _might _try to assassinate you,"

Naofumi grimaced as he considered that, "It sounds like that might happen no matter what I do," he pointed out, "I'm not a God, if I accept and screw up, they might consider me a false Hero, if I reject then they will consider me to be a _false Hero._ There's no winning here."

Ethan opened his mouth, then blinked and shut it again, "Shit," he muttered, "didn't think of that,"

That wasn't encouraging but Naofumi could understand Ethan's concern. Ethan took his duty seriously, he wasn't the _smartest _guy but he was pretty devoted to his job, and considering that his job was, in his own words, _to keep him alive so that Siltvelt didn't declare war_, it meant that this was a bloody big deal.

Ethan sighed in the end and said, "I'll get in touch with the Edgar," he promised, "I'm sure we can get some backup,"

Naofumi nodded, wondering if he should feel safe or not, it was kind of odd that it was the country that worshipped him that was a greater danger to him in almost any case than one that worshipped all the _other _heroes. Melromarc did not worship him but they weren't willing to harm him...but the disappearance of Adrian spoke of something like what could happen to him in Siltvelt.

After all, whatever risks he would face in Siltvelt, the other three faced _here_. Adrian had chosen to leave the support that Melromarc had provided behind because there were hidden costs. Siltvelt was probably the same for him. Though it might be _worse _because the Shield Hero was the only one worshipped there.

Naofumi stretched after he got off Fenral, one of the many things that people _don't _imagine properly about doing something as epic as riding a flying dragon was that it was pretty hard to sit there on the back of a flying creature for _hours _on end. Conversation was pretty much impossible since the wind took away any words and it was annoying because you had to keep shifting your position _slightly _so that you didn't fall off. Plus, there was another guy on the same bloody dragon and though Fenral was pretty big it was still more uncomfortable than a car or a bike.

Still, he couldn't deny that the dragon had worked very hard, he gave the dragon a scratch and said, "we'll get you something to eat soon."

The dragon growled in response, before lying down right at the entrance to the mansion, Naofumi sighed as Ethan looked a little annoyed at the beast.

"Fenral," said Ethan, his tone sharp, "get up and go to the stables. You know exactly where that is."

The dragon who had already closed his eyes just opened one when Ethan had started to speak before reluctantly getting up and starting to move. Naofumi felt a little bad for him but he couldn't say that Ethan was wrong here.

"Please don't worry about him," said an amused voice, "Alya here shall take care for him,"

Naofumi turned his attention towards Van Reichnott and a young woman standing at his side, Alya presumably, and nodded at the man, Ethan was a lot more formal, "Lord Reichnott, thank you for having us here again." he said.

Naofumi felt a little awkward about his casual, wordless greeting after that but the nobleman only smiled before waving a hand, making Alya go towards Fenral and leading him towards the stables while they all walked into the mansion.

"The representatives from Siltvelt have already arrived," he said, "They are quite...eager to meet you."

Naofumi got the feeling that he hadn't been about to say 'eager'. Probably something along the lines of _desperate._

"What about the others?" asked Naofumi, "I thought we had to meet up with reps from Shieldfreeden and Zeltoble as well."

The man frowned, "I am not certain," he admitted, "the representatives from Zeltoble, in particular, should have been here already but travel can be difficult in these times. A small delay is possible."

Naofumi frowned at the noble's tone, "It doesn't sound like you think that it is normal difficulties with travel."

"I do not," he said with a sheepish smile, "there are a great many parties who would like to meet you _first_. It would not be unimaginable for delays to be _fabricated _and placed before the other representatives." he sighed, "I can just hope that they are not permanently delayed."

Naofumi was _really _starting to think that he was in a political drama isekai rather than a fantasy one. Sure it had monsters and a horrible apocalypse and magic but that didn't stop humans from fucking each other up. Even worse, it looked like Siltvelt was willing to go pretty far to maintain an advantage. Naofumi _knew _full well how much of an advantage the _first _person had when trying to sell something. Sure, in this case, they were selling just how epic their country was, but it was still a sell nonetheless and he could see _why _they'd remove their competition.

Wait, would they try to _remove_ the only competition that _had _gotten the edge of them? Melromarc had summoned him after all, would they try to get rid of Ethan and then try to earn his loyalty?

Naofumi shook off his concerns. Van Reinchott wasn't sure of what had occurred it wasn't wise to jump to conclusions. He turned towards Ethan.

"What do you think?" he asked, "Is it possible?"

He took a moment to think as they went towards their rooms, "Possible? Yes, but I'm not sure how easy it would be for them to pull it off."

Naofumi blinked when he realized that Ethan had never wondered about _if _they would do it but whether or not it was practically possible for them to delay the other representatives. Naofumi sighed as he realized that these people from Siltvelt were likely to be more trouble than he had assumed.

He closed the door, took a small break and tried to get his thoughts in order. Naofumi knew that going into negotiations without a clear head was pretty much suicide and he would need to be at his best to deal with the Siltvelt representatives and refuse them without making enemies.

Naofumi tried to keep his expression cool. He was pretty good at keeping a poker face but it was one thing to stay calm when he was lying to a professor and another thing entirely when negotiating with the representative of a whole _nation_.

He took some reassurance from Ethan's silent presence at this side. It was odd but despite the fact that he had only known the man for two weeks Naofumi fully trusted him. Perhaps it was naive but he knew that while Ethan had initially viewed protecting him as something that was his duty to do currently the man actually cared about him.

They both walked into the dining room and he got his first glimpse at the two representatives from Siltvelt.

"Shield Lord," said the elder male Demi-human, he was some sort of canine, though Naofumi couldn't pin down what type exactly, "It is an honour to be in your presence."

The man and the girl next to him bowed deeply and Naofumi felt a little embarrassed about it. He had never had anyone treat him with such respect. Sure Ethan, Edgar and Van Reichnott had been polite and respectful but they hadn't been as...oddly reverential as these two. Ethan's words about Siltvelt _worshipping _the Shield Hero rang through his mind. He hadn't realized just how matter-of-fact that statement had been.

"I am Rizwan Aleick Taznim," he said, "and my lovely companion is Mirza Alama Syzar. Thank you for agreeing to meet us."

Naofumi nodded and said, "I'm Naofumi Iwatani and this is Ethan. Let's take a seat,"

The man bowed again and the girl followed before waiting for him to take a seat. Once he did so, Van Reichnott and the others followed. It struck him that _he _was sitting at the head of the table on one side while Van Reichnott was on the other. He shook off the implicit reminder of his authority as a Hero and turned towards the Demi-humans.

Both of them were quite good looking and very well-groomed. Honestly, it wasn't anything special but Naofumi had gotten used to the demi-humans in Van Reichnott's territory being fairly normal people, farmers and hunters and such, who didn't have much money to spend on keeping themselves dressed up. Rizwan was a well dressed middle-aged man with fairly formal clothing while Mirza was a very beautiful young woman who looked to be in her teens, both of them had muscles and calluses that indicated some form of hard work and indicated that they were probably not nobility. Mirza had a bright red hair that matches the cat-like ears and a tail that reminded him of a tiger with its stripes, though the colour was off.

All in all, they didn't give Naofumi the impression that they were diplomats or anything like that, hell they just seemed like adventurers who had gotten dressed up.

"So," he asked, once he realized that they were waiting for him to start the meeting, "why did you want this meeting?"

It was an obvious question and he _knew _the answer but their response would be telling. Plus, it seemed that his position as a hero would let him dominate the conversation, that was an advantage Naofumi was _happy _to use.

Interestingly the two of them looked honestly taken aback and hesitated for a moment before answering.

"Lord Shield," said Rizwan, "We seek to escort you to Siltvelt. Our people have been quite worried about your safety, especially after the Sword Hero and Bow Hero were lost."

When Rizwan had started his sentence he had wanted to laugh at the simple tactic that the man had used. Classic negotiation tactic in such extreme scenarios, no one wanted to risk their lives and people would do a _lot _to preserve it, naturally the man used it as a means to convince Naofumi to come to Siltvelt. Then, the second fraction of Rizwan's sentence hit him.

"What are you talking about?" he said with a frown, "I knew that Adrian had left the capital but what do you mean by _lost? _And what's this about Itsuki?"

The man's expression changed and became much angrier, "I see that you have been kept in the dark," he said, his tone cold, "The Sword Hero left the capital due to being falsely accused of rape, the King of Melromarc has seen fit to place a bounty on his head and has called for his capture and execution,"

"What?!" exclaimed Ethan, speaking for the first time, "That's...that's not _possible_-"

"Even we did not believe it to be possible," cut in Mirza, "but our sources have confirmed it, Princess Malty Melromarc, a woman who has made multiple such false accusations before bought up such an accusation before her father. The King immediately declared the Sword Hero to be a criminal," she tilted her head here, "perhaps you had not heard of it because the Church of Three Heroes is attempting to suppress this information."

Naofumi felt like his head was swimming, he had known that the King was biased but he had assumed that it would be nothing more than the petty bullshit that he had pulled on the first day, this was _way_ worse but he had to consider all the possibilities.

"Did Adrian actually do anything to this princess?" he asked.

Mirza looked grim, "The First Princess of Melromarc has gotten other men executed through such false accusations before, her parents have covered up such crimes, in this case, the Sword Hero was wise to leave before the King had him killed."

Ethan broke in here, "They wouldn't _dare _to do that," he said, "executing one of the three heroes would have the Church up in arms-" he cut himself off.

"Realized it have you?" said Rizwan calmly, "Your King has a plan, he is the Wise King, after all, he has summoned all Four Hereos and then committed such absurd actions, but you know full well that he is not a fool. This is all a plot of secure greater power from the Church and the nobles who have been eroding the power of the Royal Family for decades as of now the only active Hero, among the three worshipped in this country, is the Spear Hero, who is firmly in control of the Princess. Only the Sword Hero's escape disrupted his plan. As it stands the Sword Hero is without any support, the Bow Hero is likely to be dead and the Spear Hero is firmly under his control." the man turned to Naofumi, "Lord Shield, this is why we _beg _you to come with us, come to _your _country where we shall do all that is in our power to ensure your rise."

Naofumi wasn't sure what to think. Had that old man really killed Itsuki? It seemed absurd like he had gone to sleep one day and had woken up to a world where everyone had been replaced by talking toasters or something and no one gave a damn about it other than him.

Ethan recovered quickly, however, "_If _the Bow Hero is dead and _if _the Sword Hero was truly accused of rape then what you're saying is true," he turned to Van Reichnott, "my Lord have you heard anything about this…"

He nodded hesitantly, "I have heard about the Bow Heroes disappearance from my sources," he paused here, for barely a fraction of a second but then continued, "and the Sword Hero has indeed been accused of rape. Though I haven't heard about any of the details and I must point out that Mr Rizwan has only assumptions about the events, not facts,"

The Representative from Siltvelt took the criticism with grace, "You are deliberately blinding yourselves, I commend your dedication to ensuring that what I have said is the truth but as you yourself have acknowledged the Sword Hero was accused of Rape, as a close ally of the Queen I do believe that you are quite familiar with the nature of the First Princess, do you _truly _think that she is incapable of falsely accusing a man at her father command?"

Naofumi saw the eternal half-smile on the nobleman's face vanish as he reluctantly said after a sigh, "I concede your point but there is no proof that the Bow Hero was removed by the King."

The demi-human snorted, "Do you expect us to believe that is merely coincidence?" he said, then shook his head, "no matter, let us say that it is merely coincidence that both the Sword and Bow Heroes were supposed to be dealt with on practically the _same _day, let us assume that one of the most cunning men in _history _has decided to accuse the Sword Hero of a crime, that he _did not commit, _for no reason at all and thus ensured that the Church will move against him." he smiled here, an unpleasant, unhappy one, "None of this changes the fact that Lord Iwatani is at great risk in Melromarc."

The man stood up and went on his knees, even his companion seemed shocked at his actions, "My Lord, I beg you, please leave this nation. If you are sceptical of our claims then verify the facts with the safety of distance, but do not risk your life here."

Naofumi hesitated, before he said, "Get up. I don't need anyone to _beg _me to do something, I need _facts_," Naofumi shook his head wondering when the hell things had gotten so complicated.

"Naofumi," said Ethan, his tone tired, "I think that he has a point...we have to consider this. _Not _Siltvelt but we should get in touch with some of my sources and then make a decision. If any of this is true then…"

The two demi-humans seemed surprised at Ethan's statement. Naofumi himself was a little stunned, he _knew _that Ethan was supposed to keep him in Melromarc, Edgar had basically asked just for that in exchange for the man's support. Ethan was defying his leader's instructions.

"Siltvelt is absolutely devoted to Lord Iwatani's safety." said Rizwan firmly, "there is no other nation-"

"I need to think about this," he said, getting up, cutting off the man, everyone else stood up as well, "Give me a few hours,"

Naofumi ignored their calls and walked out the door, slamming it and ignoring the sound, he needed some time to reassess his assumptions. This world was a hell of a lot more dangerous than it seemed.

He shook his head remembering Itsuki and Adrian, those two had been very different, but both of them had been decent people and Naofumi remembered what the _Records of the Holy Heroes _had mentioned about Sword and Bow Heroes. The Sword who was powerful and active and the Bow who valued _justice_.

It was very easy to imagine these traits pissing off a mastermind who wanted to control them. He hoped that Rizwan was wrong...but after seeing Ethan's reaction once the King was mentioned he didn't really believe it. Maybe the representative was biased but it was unlikely that he'd lie outright when it would be _really _obvious later on.

Naofumi reached the monster stables and reached Fenral who greeted him with a screech. He relaxed a little as he gave the dragon some scratches, "What should I do?" he whispered.


	28. Chapter 28

Mr Adrian looked to her one last time before warning her and Rifana, "Please brace yourselves."

Raphtalia nodded and Rifana followed her lead after a moment. She hoped that the village wasn't in as bad a condition as Rabier had shown her but even if it was she needed to see it one last time.

Mr Adrian looked like he was about to say something but shook his head and said, "Portal."

His sword began to glow a bright blue and the world around them wavered. It was like she could _see _a transparent version of her village, a village in ruin before they were suddenlyright there.

It was the first time she had experienced the magic of teleportation but she barely paid any attention to it. She immediately realized that she was standing in front of Miss Alaya's house. The older woman had been the best tailor in town and Timol had been one of her friends. She looked away from their home. It was destroyed. One of the walls had been knocked down and the roof had crushed everything inside.

"Wow!" said Trystan, "This place is a total wreck-Ow! Hey sis-"

He was quickly shut down by his sister who had shocked him. She grabbed him by the ear and dragged him to the edge of the village. Isis sent Raphtalia an apologetic look. The demi-human nodded before starting to move around her village hand in hand with Rifana. She ignored the painful grip her friend had on her.

Mr Adrian walked with them. He kept himself at a distance but ensured that he was within her line of sight. Gratitude surged. He knew that she felt safe with him.

That emotion was brutally smothered as she saw her home.

It was in ruins like every other house but she could see the signs of what it had been before the Wave, signs of all the work she and the others had done to fix it after the Catastrophe andevidence of the soldiers that had attacked them. Raphtalia wiped her tears away and kept moving, slowly but surely trying her best to remember every single member of her village. It didn't matter who they were or if she liked them. She wanted to remember them all.

Rifana was staring blankly at the destroyed village. She didn't react when they arrived at her home. She said nothing as they stared at the ruined village centre and she merely glanced at the fields in which they used to play in. Raphtalia wondered if her idea of returning here, for one last time, before they fought the Wave tomorrow had been stupid. Mr Adrian had warned against it, stating that it could be either positive or negative and it might be wise to leave it be for another day, but she hadn't been able to drive away her fear that tomorrow _would _be her last day and that this was her very last chance to see Lurolana again.

Raphtalia slowly tugged Rifana towards the makeshift graveyard for those who had died during the Wave. She wasn't surprised when she saw that it had been vandalized but she couldn't help the tears that were falling. Raphtalia swiped her hands across her face roughly but she couldn't help it as she saw her parents resting place destroyed.

It had been nothing more than a set of empty graves with some of their favourite things set on a small stone but it had been the best she had been able to do. Something heavy pressed her chest. She couldn't _breathe_. Raphtalia didn't know if it was the rage at the scum who had done this or despair that her parents couldn't even have this much.

She heard Rifana's voice-no, not her _voice_\- her cries as she knelt at her parents' grave. It had been defiled as well.

Raphtalia jumped as Mr Adrian made his presence known, "Raphtalia," he said, "When I came here before with Isis there were some things we had taken care of. If you can identify them then we can put them to rest."

He waved towards a small cluster of graves which had a small, but well made, headstone. She hadn't noticed them because they had been slightly out of the way but. there were at least two dozen-no _more _than that.

She looked to him, unsure of what to say, but he simply said, "Illusion Sword will allow you to see the remains without having to disturb their rest."

Raphtalia nodded and saw that Rifana had heard him as well. Mr Adrian didn't smile but she could tell that he was pleased when they both got up. He projected image after image and then created a Sword for them to use so that they could carve the right names onto the gravestones. It took them nearly an hour to make sure it was all right and then clean up the other graves that had been vandalized but when she was done Raphtalia felt...lighter. Not better but at least she didn't feel like something was going to burst from her chest.

"Did you make them when you created a portal marker here?" she asked.

He nodded but kept his attention on Rifana who was staring at her parents' grave. They both stood in silence for a minute before Mr Adrian said, "Do you think it's alright if I create some plants around here to keep this place safe? Nothing extreme," he added after her worried look emerged once he had asked his question, "just to make sure that no one disturbs this place."

Raphtalia almost agreed but hesitated and turned towards Rifana.

Mr Adrian noticed, "Talk to her." he said, "I'll go check in on Isis and Trystan."

She barely finished nodding before he vanished but her desire to speak vanished when she saw that Rifana was crying again, silent tears falling down her cheeks but Rifana didn't even notice or if she did, she didn't care.

Raphtalia did the obvious thing. She went up to Rifana and hugged her and tried to ignore how odd it felt to realize that she was taller and older than her best friend. Rifana latched on quickly and within a minute, both of them were sitting in front of the remnants of their families, crying as they held each other. After a few minutes their tears dried up and though Raphtalia felt a little better she couldn't help but think that she had been really stupid to come here. Adrian had been _right. _This had been a risky move and she should have left this for later...and yet had she not arrived here today than wouldn't her parent's rest still be disturbed?

"Are you really going to fight the Waves?" asked Rifana from within Raphtalia's arms.

Raphtalia almost flinched at the sudden question before nodding in response. Rifana held on even more tightly and said, "I want to fight as well."

Surprised, she pulled back from the hug and stared at Rifana. Raphtalia knew that Rifana hated fighting. She had always been one to avoid getting _too _rowdy with the boys while Raphtalia had eagerly jumped in. It was incredibly odd to hear that she wanted to fight.

But she understood. She remembered what it was like to just watch as everything was taken from them. Fighting was tiring and messy and needed her to be very careful but it felt _empowering._ It felt _real _in a way that normal life just didn't_._

She understood what it was like to be weak and the need to be _strong._

So, even though she was scared to have Rifana on the battlefield, she nodded and said, "Okay, I'll talk to Mr Adrian."

The tremulous smile was a bittersweet victory.


	29. Chapter 29

_**Raphtalia**_

"Last equipment checks everyone," said Mr Adrian, "we have about half an hour, so make sure you have _everything _you need."

Raphtalia took in a deep breath as double-checked her equipment. It didn't take very long. Armour, Stamina, Health and healing potions around her belt and her Sword and Short Sword. The back-ups were going to be Mr Adrian's responsibility so they were not her concern. She did take a moment to study Isis and Trystan, they were ready as well. And then turned her gaze upon Mr Adrian who was sitting on top of one of the many trees he had planted around the Hourglass that Fitoria had led them to.

Once she was done she turned to Rifana who was looking at her nervously. Raphtalia hoped that she wasn't looking as scared as the girl in front of her. The teenager looked really spooked but Raphtalia knew that it was simply because she was being forced, once again, to _watch _as other went into battle. Mr Adrian had agreed to help Rifana out, just as she had expected, but he had made it clear that she had absolutely no combat skill right now and her level was simply too low at the moment to fight in a Wave when she had no skills nor practice working with team members. Raphtalia had seen the logic in his statement and she could tell that Rifana did as well, but that didn't stop Rifana from feeling bad about it.

"We'll be fine," she promised her friend. It was a genuine promise that she was certain that she could keep. Raphtalia _was _scared but she was fighting with Mr Adrian_, _Trystan and Isis. She didn't think that _anyone _could beat the three of them.

Rifana nodded, "I know," she said, but her voice wavered.

"Don't be scared!" both of them heard, and turned to see that Trystan, in his human form for once, had snuck up on them, "I'll protect her _and _Big Bro will protect us all and kill _all _the monsters."

Raphtalia had to smile at that, especially since she had seen how powerful both Trystan and his sister were since their Class Up.

"Thank you," she said, patting his head, "I'll do my best to help as well."

He smiled and then started chatting with Rifana, who slowly responded to the energetic filolial. Raphtalia turned to see Isis looking at them, who quickly turned away, once she saw Raphtalia looking, and walked up to her father, who was speaking to Fitoria. Raphtalia felt a small smile emerge when she realized that Isis must have noticed their tension and sent Trystan over to help.

That girl was a lot like her father. Kind but preferring to act from a distance.

Raphtalia took another deep breath and joined in the conversation with Trystan and Rifana. Reassuring her friend and mustering her resolve. _They _were why she fought. Her friend and her new family.

It didn't take long for Mr Adrian to declare, "Five minutes until the Wave Begins. Make absolutely sure _that _everything is ready."

But he didn't stop at that and made sure to speak to every member of his party. When it was her turn, she was surprised to find that she was really scared. Not of him but she knew that in less than two minutes they would be fighting underneath that red sky. A part of her still found it ridiculous that she was heading _towards _the monsters.

"Take a deep breath and relax," he said, hand on her shoulder, "we'll survive this. Between our power and Fitoria's aid, there is no real chance that we'll be harmed."

She nodded, "I know," she replied, looking at her feet, slightly ashamed of telling him that she was still scared despite all the help he had given her, "It's just...I can't _believe _that I'm about to fight a Wave."

"Then let this battle be the evidence you need." he said with a smile, "we'll be fine and once this is done we shall start looking into the survivors from your village."

Her head snapped towards him, "What?" she said and she could see Rifana turning towards him as well.

"You heard me," he said, his tone a little amused but quite serious, "consider that to be incentive Raphtalia. So please do your best and-It's time."

He cut himself off and then quickly drew upon a Disc. All of them, except Rifana, got on it after, while Rifana walked towards Fitoria and sat on one of the nearby Filolials after wishing them luck and a quick hug. They would all be teleported near the Wave but Rifana would be protected by what Mr Adrian had described as the most powerful being on the _planet._

Then the world around them _shattered _and she was underneath a cracked red sky again. She had seen this place in her nightmares but witnessing it again for real made her realize just how dull her memories were.

They were in some sort of forest, she could see the mountains in the distance but she couldn't tell where she was, it didn't seem familiar at all.

"Curious…" muttered Mr Adrian as he drew them up into the sky and towards the rifts from which she could see monsters pouring out.

She turned towards him, wondering _what _he found curious, even as she drew her sword and held onto it, feeling a sense of comfort at the reminder that she _could _fight back.

He didn't explain, just kept moving and then said, "Isis, combination time, Lightning and Fire with Ten thousand Swords,"

The white-haired filolial nodded, and then both of them began to chant, the magical energy was palpable and it made the hair along her arms stand on end. She swallowed as she was reminded of the sheer _power _that both of her party members held.

Even as they chanted Mr Adrian created four swords and set them to float around them, he didn't bother using them to attack but Raphtalia found herself growing more and more tense as they neared the rifts. She could _see _the monsters now.

"_Blade Storm," _they intoned, their voices speaking in perfect unison and instantly hundreds of blades covered in fire or lightning began to manifest and start flying towards the monster. She thought it looked impressive as it travelled, streaks of blue or yellow moving at incredible speeds that she could barely see, but it was only when approached their targets that the corona of fire or lightning around them _expanded _and she realized just how insanely destructive the attack truly was.

Mr Adrian - no, this was the _Sword Hero -_ vanished from her sight and she managed to find him again because he created another set of swords, wreathed in lightning and fire, around him at his new position and launched them as well.

Again she heard the screams and screeches from all around her as he kept on doing this _again _and again and again. He didn't take very long but by the time he was done and had returned she couldn't see any monsters but the impact of their attacks was obvious. The whole area around them looked like hell. The fires had gone out once the attack was over, a sign of how much control that casters had over them, but the damage was incredible. The entire area had been flattened as if a giant had _stomped _it and she could see _hundreds- _no, thousands - of bodies all around her, each and every one of them killed horrifically by either fire, lightning, both _or _a sword.

Mr Adrian casually surveyed the destruction and noted, "that was fairly successful. Plus we all leveled up. Isis, make sure to save enough power to do that at least once more."

Raphtalia felt herself relax a little at his matter-of-fact tone and checked her status magic. 

_**Raphtalia Lv 48  
Adrian Black Lv 54  
Isis Lv 48  
Trystan Lv 48  
Rifana Lv 43**_

She blinked at the realization that she had leveled up _twice _while Rifana had gotten _three _levels. It had barely been _two _minutes since the Wave had started. Just how many monsters had Isis and Adrian killed?!

"I'm going to drop you three off over there," he said, pointing towards an area East from their location, "two of the rifts are closeby so you should have a reasonable number of monsters come into play _and _it's central so I can reach you swiftly in case of an emergency. Remember your tactics _and _don't hesitate to simply run if need be. Understood?"

His tone of voice convinced them all to answer instantly.

"Good." he said and then moved the Disc to the position they were meant to hold, "the monsters will start flooding in within about a minute, Good luck."

Then he _vanished_, leaving behind the disc and a small collection of potions, weapons and other objects. Most likely a precaution.

Both Raphtalia and Trystan turned to Isis, who immediately turned towards the Rift and noted, "The monsters will be here in about two minutes," she said, "I'll set up some barricades. Please take the front lines, I'll stay here at the back."

Raphtalia nodded and then felt a little awe as the filolial casually reshaped the earth, felled some trees and then had Trystan create some barriers to create some terrain that could protect them. Once she was done, the whole area was _far _easier to defend, she hoped that it wouldn't be needed but Mr Adrian had insisted that they practice making fortifications like this. It would be useful for when they needed to protect vulnerable targets.

She felt a surge of grief as she realized that had Mr Adrian been summoned just a few weeks early her village would have been safe.

Then, there was no time for thought as the monsters arrived.

The first four that she fought were wolves that had glowing red eyes and were as large enough that their heads were on level with her _head_. Raphtalia found herself gripping her sword tightly and preparing herself to chant, she only had two magics but both _Zuerst Light _and _Hide _would help here.

Isis didn't share her fear. The filolial barely looked at them before a lightning bolt emerged from her body and struck the first wolf which howled him pain before collapsing, twitching from the massive current running through its muscles. The other Wolves stopped, wary, but ended up dead as the lightning jumped from wolf to wolf killing them all.

Raphtalia smiled at their success but found her focus sharpening as more monsters emerged. Some of them were wolves, but it didn't stop there, she could see wolf-bird chimaera's, some flying insects, and several other types of monsters.

"Trystan, Raphtalia," said Isis, her tone cold, "Please work together to stop them. I'll support you from the back. Trystan, buffs, _now."_

The bird nodded and Raphtalia felt her body lighten as he cast enhancement after enhancement on her, but the time he was done she felt _invincible._ She did her best to dismiss the emotion, she knew that it was only a 30% increase in her attack, defence and speed. She couldn't get arrogant about that.

The first target she attacked was one of the Wolves, a single slash cut through its snout, skull and a portion of its body, but its packmates took advantage of her being busy and tried to attack her.

Trystan _landed _on top of him and then bounced off the crushed body without a backward glance.

Raphtalia felt her thoughts fade away as she simply hacked away at monster after monster. On occasion, she felt the heat from a massive blast of fire or her hair standing up thanks to lightning near her thanks to Isis but she ignored those. Her friend wouldn't hit her.

The demi-human took in a deep breath as she faced off against a bear whose body was at least three times as large as she was. Four powerful limbs tipped with Claws and saliva that seemed to be quite acidic. A moment of thought and she blitzed towards it, and in another second she had cut through its' limbs on the right side, while it was roaring in pain, a sound that made her ears _ache_. Then, she executed the bear, ignored the blood splatter on her and looked towards her party.

The monsters had been removed from the area. She could still see them at a distance but she knew that it would take them at least two or three minutes to reach them here. Raphtalia turned her focus towards her teammates and found that Trystan, like her, was covered in blood and other monster remains. It wasn't easy to see over his black feathers but she could tell that he was positively _covered _in them.

Isis was pristine. Her equipment was clean, as if she had just been taking a walk, rather than fighting for her life and she was simply sitting down on a raised platform of earth, while a massive orb of fire floated above her.

Raphtalia knew that Isis had been fighting as well but it was hard to believe when she saw the girl as relaxed as she was.

"Drink your stamina potions," said Isis, "we have another large batch coming in soon."

Raphtalia nodded, while Trystan answered with a cheerful 'got it, sis'.

She took a deep breath, drank the potion, wiped her sweat with the small cloth attached to her belt and then prepared herself. The fight had been both easier and more difficult than expected. None of the monsters had been a threat but their numbers were a concern. If it hadn't been for Isis, she and Trystan would have been forced to retreat and fight a running battle, probably exhausting themselves for almost no reason.

Raphtalia noted that the monsters were coming in close, and got herself ready, she could already identify some of the monsters but others were new. A glance at her sword and the _feel _of it in her hands let her calm down even as she felt a sort of thrill rise.

Then a thin beam of golden light cut through most of them in an instant, the following glowing swords which proceeded to explode simply finished off the rare survivors that could live despite being cut into two pieces.

She knew it had to be Mr Adrian and his sudden appearance in front of them proved it, but it was still jarring to see him casually slaughter a group of monsters than would have taken them a couple of minutes to kill. She felt herself relax and winced as her fatigue hit her, stamina potion or not that _had _been tiring.

His eyes strayed to the numerous corpses littering the area and he smiled before he said, "Well done. Any concerns?"

"Nothing father," said Isis, answering for them all, "the monsters have been weak and their numbers manageable."

He smiled, "Good. Please get on the disc, there's another high-density region, I'll deal with this area."

Raphtalia almost winced at the thought but she moved onto the disc, "Mr Adrian," she asked, as they moved into the sky, Mr Adrian still occasionally shooting off blasts of energy "has the boss monster emerged yet?"

What she was really asking was if he was having trouble with it? It _should _have come out by now.

"It has," he admitted, "I've crippled it but it's still alive."

She frowned, feeling alarmed as she wondered what sort of monster could survive Mr Adrian, "Do you need our help fighting it?"

He laughed, "I can kill it at any time. I'm keeping the poor beast alive so that I can continue to study the Wave _and _gather some experience-." he cut himself off, frowned and then created a couple of dozen swords and sent them flying.

The subsequent screeches and explosions were expected.

"Right," he said, "As I was saying, this is a unique chance to study a wave in a controlled environment. I was planning to end it as soon as possible but the Wave is more manageable than I had anticipated."

"Mr Adrian," she said feeling both angry and worried at his casual behaviour, "you _can't _just do…" she didn't even know _what _to say. She hadn't ever imagined the incredibly cautious man she had come to know do something so _stupid._

The Sword Hero looked amused, but he sobered up quickly, "Raphtalia take a look at your level." 

_**Raphtalia Lv 55  
Adrian Black Lv 58  
Isis Lv 55  
Trystan Lv 55  
Rifana Lv 50**_

Her eyes widened at the numbers. Adrian was quick to notice her surprise.

"We have only been fighting for about 25 minutes." he said, his voice serious, "we've gained more experience in the last twenty minutes than we have in the last _week._"

"But-"

"It'll help us in future Waves if we're higher leveled _and _know about the patterns of monster release-" he cut himself off, "we don't have time for this. Another large batch is being released. Isis help me out with a combo we'll talk later Raphtalia."

Raphtalia nodded. Unhappy but willing to play along for now. They needed to fight right now. Even if it was frustrating to see Mr Adrian _extend a Wave _for some experience. 

_*****************************************************************************************  
Adrian **_

Adrian had Isis in his arms, chanting in preparation for their combination spell, prior to her Class Up and Fitoria's blessing this would have been impractical, a technique that simply cost Isis too much to be used, but, here and now, _Blade Storm _was incredibly useful.

Isis' power combined with his coursed through him. Every inch of his body felt like it was on _fire _but despite the novel sensation, everything felt amazing, his senses were operating at their maximum, he didn't need to think, to _try_ to do _anything._ Instead, he was simply aware of everything around him, there was no need to activate any of his skills deliberately, it was like they knew what he wanted before he _knew _that he needed it.

So, when they shaped their spell, Adrian casually held it back, delivered Isis and his party to their new location. A place where they would face a reasonably large horde of monsters and then returned to his standby position. A location nearly a kilometre up in the air in the middle of the rifts.

Then he slowly unravelled the spell. It was like he had ten thousand swords stored inside of himself and he had to release them and then choose if he wanted them surrounded in Fire or Lightning. He drew on five hundred, split evenly between Fire and Lightning, and then directed them at his foes.

He didn't bother to observe the aftermath, instead, he simply made sure to compare the corpses to his experience gains and then moved on. On occasion, he would have a survivor, but a single, momentary Sword Beam or Explosive sword removed them from the game and allowed him to continue.

He kept on moving. His attention shifting to and from multiple concerns. One was the Wave Boss, a massive crocodile-like beast that was nearly 40 meters long, that he had pinned down, enslaved and then electrocuted continuously to keep it in line after all that Boss was the reason he could harvest experience so easily.

The other of course was the rest of the Wave which had proven to be quite underwhelming.

Adrian had received information on the Wave from many sources, all of them biased, but he had assumed _some _truth from each of them. Fitoria had called these early Waves to be annoying but easy and he had taken her words with a healthy dose of scepticism. Easy for the strongest being on the planet _didn't _mean easy for anyone else. Most humans he has spoken to had spoken about it in tones of fear. So he had assumed millions of monsters flooding out of a portal. And of course, he'd had the light novel, which had provided almost no real information, focusing on Naofumi's struggles and rarely on the Wave as a whole.  
The truth was different.

At first, after the Wave opened up around 15,000 or so monsters had been unleashed. Significant in number and nothing else. His combination technique with Isis had crushed nearly 13,000 of them and he had annihilated the remainder over the next two or three minutes. Frankly, the fact that they were clustered near each other after they came out of the rifts was insanely useful. It let him kill them in droves with ease.

Still, he had continued his slaughter even as the number of monsters dropped and only a slow trickle continued. He had placed his party where the largest number of monsters were emerging from and taken care of the other ten rifts with ease. Sure while he'd take care of one rift, the others would continue spitting out more monsters, but that just meant having a larger target for bombardment when he decided to kill them.

Even the Wave Boss had been underwhelming and easy to cripple. His biggest limitations in dealing with the Waves were his cooldowns, skill limits and stat limits. The monsters themselves had absolutely no tactics, no strategy or skill. Their only advantage, numbers, was squandered since it meant that they were simply throwing living bags of experience at him.

Adrian loved this. Loved simply spamming his skills while directed with a little bit of logic and reaping a disproportionate harvest of experience.

It was nearly an hour after the Wave had started that he realized that the rifts were closing. He frowned, realizing that this was one of those cases where the rifts closed on their own. Adrian shrugged it off and decided to end this.

A moment of thought detonated the swords embedded within the Boss. Another moment and he had summoned up his Ten Thousand Sword Skill again to crush several widely distributed targets. He used _Dash _to reposition himself rapidly to crush as large a fraction of the remnants as possible _and _then used Sword Beams, a series of massive ones for once, to clear the skies. He created the beam using a dozen projected swords at once and the massive golden beam that resulted was one that he rotated all around himself in four different locations.

_Everything _in the sky, except for him, died, annihilated in an instant.

As the sky turned back to blue and he crushed the last remnants of the monsters that his party were facing he found himself smiling and planning. 

_**Adrian Black Lv 62  
Raphtalia Lv 57  
Isis Lv 60  
Trystan Lv 57  
Rifana Lv 54**_

Adrian looked all around the area he had just been slaughtering in. Tens of thousands of corpses, hundreds of different types of monsters and more experience than he had gained since his entry into this world. It didn't take a genius to realize one simple fact.

He needed to fight more Waves.

However, before he did that he needed to boost the power of his party members _or _get more of them.

Adrian used _Dash _to arrive at their location and wondered how to increase their power. As it stood Trystan and Raptalia had been of very limited use. It had been Isis and himself who had crushed the Wave. Sure Trystan's buffs were useful and both of them had fought valiantly...but that wasn't really needed. Their lack of area of effect attacks and limited mobility ensured that they had only killed around 2000-3000 monsters and most of that was only due to Isis' area of effect strikes _and _the fact that he had been herding monsters towards them.

He would need another 15 party members or so to perfectly suppress the Wave _and _he needed a way to boost their mobility. It was time to focus on recruitment and versatility of techniques rather than individual power gain.

"Mr Adrian," said Raphtalia, her tone rather...displeased. He turned to look at her and found her completely _covered _in monster blood, guts and sweat.

Adrian kept a polite smile on his face but winced internally. He had been enjoying himself a _little _too much it seemed. He had paid attention to whether or not his party was injured, he _hadn't _been concerned about much else. He quickly looked into Isis and Trystan and felt a burst of relief that they were alright, hell, Isis looked pristine. Much like himself she simply looked like she had gone for a run, rather than having fought a massive horde of monsters.

He geared himself up for an annoying conversation. It would _not _be easy to convince someone who had lost _everything _to the Waves that it was wise to keep it open for some experience.

Still, he found himself rather happy, he couldn't imagine the Raphtalia of last week openly challenging him about _anything._ Perhaps this day would be good for more reasons than one. 

The most annoying part of dealing with the Wave had been the cleanup and harvesting process. Adrian had thought he had been freed from the burden of butchering monsters for hours after fighting them for minutes and he was. But it turns out absorbing the corpses of over 60,000 monsters takes a hell of a lot of time.

In the end, Fitoria's filolials ended up eating a lot of it, though he made sure to ensure that he got enough samples to master a form, and it still took him nearly eight hours to fully absorb everything, kill some rare survivors that showed up and then put out all the fires and absorb the trees, soils and such that had been damaged by his attack.

Looking at the situation now, after the combat high had passed, he realized that he had been way too destructive. If the Wave opened up above a city or a town most of his attacks would have left horrific amounts of collateral damage. Essentially, he was ready to fight a Wave _if _it ended up in a relatively remote region but in any populated region, he'd up ruining the place without even trying.

The small celebration they had held afterwards had been nice. He'd made enough food for Fitoria and her filolials and it had been rather entertaining watching everyone relax. Even Rifana had participated though he was pretty sure it was just because she was so relieved overseeing her friend return to her unharmed.

"Sword Hero," said Fitoria, while he cleaned up the place, absorbing the mess that had been left behind. He'd reuse it later for something else, "there is something...odd I have to speak to you about."

He frowned at her serious tone. It was a contrast from her happy expressions earlier on this day.

"Of course," he said, turning his full attention towards her, "What is it about?"

"It's the Bow," she said, her face scrunching up a little, "it is behaving weirdly. It's not helping the barrier properly."

"The Legendary Bow and _not _the Bow Hero?" he asked, finding it a little odd that the two were treated separately.

She nodded rapidly and he found himself frowning as he realized that she was genuinely worried about this. He _really _didn't want to think about what could worry her.

"I see. Can you track him down?" he asked, "I can speak to him if you don't want to bother and we can see if there's something wrong."

He wasn't sure how accommodating Itsuki would be or even if the boy would realize that there was something wrong but it was worth a try...and it would reveal just _how _Fitoria had tracked him down if he was lucky.

She shook her head, "I can't find him. I tracked down the other heroes, and they're fine, but I can't find the Bow Hero."

"Is he dead?" asked Adrian, feeling a chill run down his spine as he realized that Fitoria might just have a better reason to kill him than before but she just shook her head again before pausing.

"I'm not sure," she admitted, "the Bow _is _helping but it's not consistent. It stops and starts."

"Is that why you can't track him?" he asked, wondering how he should go about finding Itsuki. The easiest option might be the Adventurer's Guild. He had noticed that there were a bunch of adventurers in the man's party _and _if his memory served him right, it was the Guild that had given him missions to do.

Then again, he didn't even know if they even knew about his disappearance. He sighed as he realized that he would have to get back to civilization again and deal with _politics._ Adrian choosing to abandon his party was going to bite him back right about now.

"Yes," she said, "Sword Hero, please find the Bow Hero and bring him to me, if he is not dead, I can check the Legendary Bow to ensure its' function. If he is captured please free him."

Adrian nodded. A little annoyed at the situation but more worried. He felt a surge of guilt come into play as well. He had basically ditched the other three heroes. He hadn't even bothered looking back while leaving them in the lion's den and now it seemed that Itsuki had suffered for it. Motoyasu was probably fine but Naofumi was likely to be in a great deal of trouble. He needed to check on them and _fast._ Fitoria may have said that they were okay but he doubted she'd give a damn about them unless they were dead or in Itsuki's case not fueling the barrier around the world.

Then felt surprised at his thoughts and how different they were from before. It was odd to realize just how _warped _his thinking had been after he had been summoned here. Even if Itsuki, Motoyasu and Naofumi were annoying it didn't justify him _leaving _them there without even _trying _to help. His actions had served him well and he could say that Rifana and Raphtalia had received a few benefits from it but it was important that he acknowledged that it had hurt others as well.

"Alright," he said, accepting the job, "but I'll need your help for the start. Can you tell me where the Shield and Spear Heroes are? I can check in on their situations _and _see if they have any information about the Bow Hero."

Fitoria was quite apathetic and merely shrugged before saying "Okay. Please resolve this quickly and make sure that they'll fight the Waves as well."

He nodded and she quickly gave him the locations after he pulled out his Cartographers Sword. Adrian decided that he'd have to check in on Naofumi first soon, just to make sure that he was alright, then go to the Capital and hit two birds with one stone. The Slave Trader would be a useful source of information _and _allies. All he needed was a place to house them and the resources to keep them alive and equip them. And now he had all of those things.

It would be satisfying to have that man dead and his slaves freed. They might not agree to help him but the Trader did have monsters. Adrian could be certain that he'd at least receive _some _allies even if _none _of the Demi-humans agreed to help him. Plus, he could get some information on the people from Raphtalia's village. 


	30. Chapter 30

_Adrian_

Adrian waved goodbye to Isis and Raphtalia in a location that was nearly 4000 kilometres from Melromarc about an hour after sunrise. An instant later he was in the middle of Lurolana village, the Sun was high in the sky, and he was standing in a ruined village whose only remarkable feature was a massive, colourful plant at a cliffside overlooking the sea.

He activated _Blindsight_, verified that distortions weren't in range, and then moved closer to the giant plant that was wrapped around the graveyard.

The plant showed up as _Bio plant Alpha v5.67 _a name he had granted it after his many, many experiments. It was a simple if massive looking plant that was quite harmless...unless you tried to harm one of the Gravestones or launched an attack at it. _Then _it tried it's best to poison and capture whatever poor bastard was in range. It wasn't intelligent but it was responsive enough to manage that and while Raphtalia wasn't aware of it the roots of the plant was spread out over the whole village and beyond.

It was good to see that it had not exceeded its' bonds and a pity that nothing had provoked it. Adrian had been almost certain that some monster or the other would have tested it out by now. He shrugged, used his appraisal on it one last time, and then moved away using _Dash_, he would like to spend a bit more time tinkering but he didn't have the time to waste.

Adrian smiled as he moved towards Ayrith, alternating between _Dash _and simply running, the last time he had done this on open ground for the sake of travel had been when he had been running away from the Castle Town. Fear and disgust had driven him from the city in an impulsive move that he was quite happy about, even if it had resulted in some negative consequences for Itsuki.

His guess was that it would take him about half an hour to make it to Ayrith, maybe a little more in the worst-case scenario, which was _just _enough for his Portal Skill to recharge again. Adrian did love his new skill, but that just made its flaws stand out starkly. Only ten locations could be saved for Quick Travel. Cooldown of 35 minutes was inescapable and worst of all, only 15 party members could be transported at any time.

It was still a broken technique whose utility was second to none but these limits persisted _despite _the fact that he had spent days worth of proficiency points upgrading it and had provided liberal amounts of Dragon Hourglass Sand. He would continue to upgrade it but he didn't have any hope of that providing any useful results any time soon unless he discovered an enhancement method that was particularly useful.

The good part was that he had unlocked the Dragon Hourglass Sword which let him boost people during their Class Up and delevel people, as long as he was near an hourglass and had their consent...which could be casually bypassed if he hit them with a slave seal. It was an amazing option which he would definitely be using in the future. The only problem was that upgrading the Hourglass Sword was insanely hard and so the boosts to those whom he classed up were pretty minor, nothing compared to Fitoria's boost, though it was more flexible.

Adrian felt a smile emerge as he neared Ayrith, the monsters had yet to return and it seemed that there were no traces of any people either, a quick stop and check once the town entered the range of his _Blindsight _allowed him to confirm his earlier observations. The town was safe, the trees he had positioned as food source, water gathering facility and security had not gone out of control, though he would have to get close and use Plant Appraisal to be certain.

He was likely to be welcome here, something he needed, given that he was planning to see if he could recruit some of them.

Adrian focused on his Portal Sword and marked his current position. It would be a useful place to appear. Close enough to be convenient and far enough to allow him to gauge the mood in town without risk.

Once he appeared before the Gate the two sentries, Nicol and the fox demi-human whose name he'd never learned, moved into action. Javelins were placed into position before they recognized him and relaxed slightly.

"Sir Adrian," said Nicol, a small smile on her face, while the other guard relaxed, "Welcome back!"

"It's good to be back Miss Nicol," he said formally, "may I enter?"

She snorted at that, "As if we could stop you!" she said, amused, before jumping off from her post and landing in front of him before giving him a deep bow.

The gate opened with a laborious creek and Adrian quickly check it with his Plant Appraisal, nodding to himself when he found that it was working perfectly. The Gate had been his best and most complex word. Adrian felt a weight lift off of him when he realized that it was all likely to be working fine.

She waved her hand and led the way in, "What brings you here Mr Adrian?" she asked, "You were going to be busy for at least a week."

"We had an unexpected windfall," he admitted, thinking of Fitoria, "so there was an opportunity to visit Ayrith. I have a secret to tell you and your father and an offer for your town."

Nicol lost most of her easy-going expression and looked to him seriously, "Have the slave hunters mustered their numbers up again?" she asked, "Or is it the monsters?"

He raised an eyebrow, "I would have dealt with either of those," he said, brushing it off, "No, this is a little personal. I promise your village isn't at risk at the moment."

She nodded, relaxing a little, "Father is in his office," she said and then led the way there, their time occupied by banal conversation about his other party members, while she updated him about Alvin and Razieh.

Adrian had known that Oldrin was relaxing in his office from the moment he had scouted the town so he was hardly surprised by the fact. It was a little jarring to realize just how little people were aware of normally. How little he must have seen before he gained the Sword. It spooked him that he didn't want to imagine a life without _Blindsight _or the ability to move faster than any vehicle.

"Mr Adrian," said the older wolf-demi-human, "It is an honour."

"Please relax Oldrin," he said, seating himself in the slightly uncomfortable chair, suppressing the temptation to draw on his more comfortable furniture, "we have a lot to talk about."

"Of course," he said, and sat down himself, Nicol stood at his side and then waited for him to continue, ceding control of their meeting to him. Adrian appreciated the gesture, it made him feel a little better about his decision.

"I suppose I should start with the basics." mused Adrian, while drawing the small knife he had hidden his sword as and changing it to the more recognizable base form, "I am the Sword Hero and I wish to ask for your aid in fighting the Waves of Calamity."

Their shocked expressions were something he would savour for a long time.

"The Sword Hero...you're the _Sword Hero!" _exclaimed the old man, "It's no wonder that you-"

The man cut himself off before standing up and then bowing low, lower than before, "Forgive us for our impertinence Holy Saint we meant no offence."

Nicol looked a little shocked at her father's subservient behaviour but followed his lead. Adrian felt his amusement wither. Was this all that he could expect from people? And why were two _demi-humans_ so respectful anyway? He wasn't the Shield Hero.

"Oldrin, Nicol." he said, getting their attention, "_Please _sit down. I am still Adrian and nothing more and we have a lot more to discuss."

That woke them both up and they took their seats again. Nicol looked a little sheepish but Oldrin was basically _vibrating._

"Yes Holy Saint," said the old man, his tone reverent.

Adrian ignored the discomfort and spoke, "I wanted to check if there was anyone in your town who'd be willing to volunteer to fight the Waves. The only requirement is some reasonable skill in combat, be it magical or with a weapon."

At this the old man's excitement faded a little. Adrian felt a spark of satisfaction. He _should _take this seriously. To most people, the Waves were more than a massive Experience lottery.

"The Waves my Lord," he said hesitantly, "I…"

Adrian raised an eyebrow at the 'my lord' thing but ignored it for the moment and expanded in the face of their worry, "The Waves are set to grow stronger over time. I fought a Wave yesterday and managed to suppress it but I suspect that to do so for future Waves I'll need a lot of allies. This Sword," he said, transforming the weapon to the Hourglass Sword, "is capable of empowering my allies to an incredible degree so strength is not really a requirement when it comes to selecting my allies…what matters is _trust _and I believe that your town is my best bet there."

"You honour us," said Nicol formally, when it was clear that her father wouldn't be saying anything, the old man actually had _tears _in his eyes. He clearly took the Legendary Heroes _way _too seriously.

Adrian snorted in response, "I'm not honouring you," he corrected, "I'm offering you a deal. Help me fight the Waves and I'll do my best to provide you training, equipment and most importantly _experience and stat boosts._ I do not exaggerate when I state that I can take a level 1 individual to level 60 in less than ten days, and thanks to my boosts they are on par with level _100's _at that point."

He leaned forward, "In other words, you get a handful of incredibly powerful guardians for your town, who will be here with you unless a Wave is active or they are training and in return I get trustworthy warriors who will not betray me. What do you think?"

They looked a little stunned. Oldrin, in particular, looked like he would collapse but Nicol gathered her wits, "But we will have to risk our lives during the Waves."

"Correct," he said, not sugar-coating it, "your life will be at risk for as long as the Waves exist. I cannot promise that you will be safe even if I _do _promise to do everything in my power to bring you back alive and to take care of your dependents should you perish."

"We will do-"

"We would like to think on this matter," said Nicol, ignoring Oldrin's mutinous look.

"Of course," he said, "I would not have agreed to anything you said right in this moment anyway. Please discuss it with your candidates. Warn them that I _will _check to ensure their loyalty and dedication and then give me a response. I'll be back in two days."

She nodded and Adrian smiled before activating his Portal.

He didn't go far, just to the marker he had _just_ made, but that small demonstration of power was an example of just how far beyond them he was. A reminder of just _who _they were dealing with...and it was damn funny to see their expressions with _Blindsight._

He took a deep, cleansing, breath and opened up the Map Sword. Frustration manifested as the immense area that Fitoria had marked became obvious.

Adrian oriented himself according to Fitoria's poor directions and then _moved. _Hoping to get to Naofumi.

_Naofumi_

Naofumi was growing increasingly irritated.

Fenral, the three Fiolials that his current party were riding on and Mirza were not a problem. The three animals were nice and were very fond of him. Willing to stay quiet the moment he made the request. Mirza was a polite, professional young woman who reminded him of the many office going women from his world even though she was an adventurer dressed in eminently practical and rather dirty armour.

Rizwan and Ethan, on the other hand, had started to really piss him off.

"...what do you know _human_? It is your misjudgement that has placed the Lord at risk-"

"First off," replied Ethan, in a dry voice, "your _Lord_ is human as well. Second, I've been the one helping him while you lot decided to play _politics_."

Ethan spat out the last word in the same way Rizwan had when pronouncing 'human' and Naofumi's patience snapped.

"Shut up." he hissed, turning back to look at the two men, both of them who were _older _than he was, "We are on the run from a bloody cult and you two morons are _wasting _energy insulting each other. Keep your mouth _shut _unless you have something useful to say."

He turned back around, revelled in the silence, and kept moving.

Mirza's amused, "Nice," was ignored.

Right now they were riding their mounts, Fenral and three Filolials that Van Reichnott had provided, through the mountainous terrain that was so common in Melromarc. Their goal was the border in order to crossover into a country that would eventually lead to Siltvelt or at least would _not _be Melromarc.

The problem, of course, was that the Church had moved before them. Two days in the past, after they had just finished meeting Rizwan and Mirza for the first time, Ethan had received a message from Edgar, a message confirmed by one of Van Reichnott's shadows', that the Church had started to mobilize against him.

They had nothing more than guesses about _why _but Naofumi was fairly certain that Ethan's theory was correct. He believed that it was King Melromarc who had decided to remove the last hero from the Game and had pressured the Church, who were already biased against him, into doing so. Even Rizwan had agreed with the theory, a rare thing as he now knew, so he was pretty sure that he was right.

Honestly, Naofumi was stunned to realize just how dangerous that old man was. It was hard to think of that old man slouching on the throne as the _great King of Wisdom _or the Star Hero of the Cane or even the Demon of Melromarc but he supposed it was an excellent example of how appearances could be deceptive.

So, with a cult potentially coming to kill him, he had chosen to leave. It was odd to have his decision made for him, slightly relieving but mostly _terrifying_ given that the choice had become obvious because his other option was to be _executed._

They'd encountered a small group of soldiers under the Church's command but it had cost them no real effort to take them apart. Between Naofumi's skills and his party's attack, they had not struggled at all. Though it had been a surprise to realize that it was _Mirza _who was the highest level member of their party at level 68, which was absurdly high, while he was only at 32 and amusingly enough both his other members were at the same level 54, though it was pretty clear that Ethan was a hell of a lot better at combat. The Filolials and Fenral, unfortunately, weren't very high level at all, with all of them being in their tens or in Fenral's case twenties, but that wasn't a surprise, their job was transportation _not _combat.

Naofumi tried to dismiss his nausea at the thought of the dead church agents.

_None _of his party members had shown a hint of mercy, even Ethan whom he had assumed would hold back against humans had killed them, it made _sense_, anyone alive would give away the position and information about who they were travelling with but it had made him sick to watch them die_._

He was hoping not to get into another fight.

It was a wish he knew would not come true.

Naofumi grimaced as he stared at the border wall from the cliffside. It was _infested _with soldiers. They were checking every single person who was going through and he could see a _lot _of mages on the walls.

Ethan voiced his thoughts, "We cannot pass through from here. Those men...they are from specialized squads meant to be able to use Ceremonial Magics. I believe they may have activated the alarm wards along the walls."

Naofumi sighed, "Any ideas?" he asked. Their plan to move around to find a slightly poorly defended section of the border had crashed before it could even get started. He was beginning to wonder just _how _the Church had moved so quickly...or was it that it was _their _moves that were predictable?

"I believe that we should move to the coast," stated Rizwan, "there is always _some _form of smuggling in the docks we can make use of them to move out into the open ocean. The ward is unlikely to be able to extend there."

Ethan considered that before nodding slowly, "I agree," he said in a voice that made it clear that the agreement was positively painful.

Naofumi looked to his last party member, "They're right," she said, "but Melromarc is going to be expecting it, we'll need a plan or we'll get trapped just like we are now...and they're going to be chasing us the whole way, we'll need a _lot _of luck to survive, especially if they start pulling out things like Judgements,"

"Judgements?" he asked, feeling unnerved by the name.

Mirza smiled coldly, "It is the favourite Combat Ceremonial Class Spell of Melromarc. A massive beam of mana that strikes a target with enough force that even well-defended fortresses end up annihilated. It was created by the Church of Three Heroes, inspired by an attack that the other Heroes have."

"Fuck," he muttered and stared at his Shield. He liked it but he doubted that it would let him survive a hit from something like that.

"I believe we should keep moving Naofumi," said Ethan, "we don't have the time to spare."

He nodded and they slowly backtracked, moving over the narrow mountain passes, trying to start moving towards the Seaetto Region, which held the coasts of Melromarc.

They moved for hours until the sun had long since set before the took a small breather in a cave system, Ethan quickly cleared out the area of any monsters and then they took a small meal of rations. Naofumi made a note to thank Ethan and Van Reichnott, it had been Ethan who had suggested taking the ration bars and Van Reichnott who had provided them.

He wondered if the man was okay, it was entirely likely that the Church had decided to interrogate him...or if they knew that he had been in the area, kill him.

Naofumi tried to shake off the guilt and convince himself that the Lord and his people would have no trouble with the Church as he leaned against Fenral in an attempt to sleep.

He failed.

It was hours later, during Mirza's watch, that he was awakened by the insistent movement of his shoulders.

He jerked upwards to see Rizwan shaking his shoulder while Mirza and Ethan rushed to the mouth of the cave. Their mounts had also gotten up and were milling about nervously.

Naofumi stood up, his best Shield at the ready, and whispered to Rizwan, "What is it?"

"Mirza sensed some people nearby, my lord," he said, his voice quiet, "she is attempting to assess the situation."

He nodded, trying to stay calm, as thanked his night vision skill, it let him see in the darkness of the cave.

The next couple of minutes were the tensest of his life. More than once an innocent sound sent his heartbeat haywire but he did his best to look and stay calm, even as he regretted ever being summoned into this hell hole.

Then, Ethan arrived to speak to them at the back of the cave, "It's clear for now," he whispered, "but they were close and Miss Mirza is quite certain that they were looking for us. We shall wait for a few minutes before moving."

He nodded and then tried to keep himself busy, tried _not _to think about how this was easily the worst moment of his life and tried _not _to think of home.

"Kill the Shield Demon!" came the warcry from the soldiers that swarmed over their position.

Mirza began to glow as she chanted quietly while she stood behind him, "_Stone to Boulder," _she exclaimed and then launched some small orbs of golden light.

For a second he grimaced, wondering if the spell had gone wrong, and moved in front of their only _true _mage. Then, the small spheres expanded and turned into massive, five-meter diameter, boulders, _crushing _the poor bastards who had the fate of being underneath them.

Most of the Soldiers were dealt with so he nodded at Mirza and moved to support Rizwan who was struggling with his own group.

Time seemed to flow oddly, slowing and speeding up without rhyme or reason, a blocked fireball, a slash from a sword that he just ignored, a _Zuerst Shield _to help out Ethan as a mage took a pot shot at him. It all blurred together.

By the time the battle ended he was covered in blood but had no wounds. His party was not as fortunate.

He spat on the ground, the ambush had gotten their Filolials killed, Fenral was badly injured and while they were mostly okay, they were out of food _and _medicine.

Naofumi walked up to his party members and chanted, "_Zuerst Heal," _

Fenral got four extra doses but the first level spell he had learned from the Orb could only heal basics wounds and did _nothing _for fatigue. So he left it to Ethan to bandage the wing so with some of the tunics from their enemies.

He tried not to think of the many dead bodies littering the clearing.

"We need to move," he said, "_Now!" _

His party nodded grimly even as Naofumi knelt at the side of the Filolials and absorbed them fully. The mastered shields would be worth it.

Then he looked at the dismembered corpses that Ethan had made. The crushed ones that Mirza was responsible for and the poisoned ones that Rizwan had killed. Naofumi swallowed his disgust and absorbed them all until he had mastered all the _anti-human _shields.

"Let's go," he said and his party followed. Their morale shot and prospects dim. Their only hope, reaching the coast or a town where Edgar might be able to support them, was unlikely to manifest into anything. None of them were particularly optimistic, though he could tell that Rizwan was taking a grim satisfaction at dying at the side of the Shield Hero.

Naofumi felt a surge of bitter amusement at the idea. At least one of them would die happy.


	31. Chapter 31

_**Adrian**_

Adrian had been enjoying himself while travelling. Studying the new skills he had gained and cheerfully observing his stats that had once again increased. It had been very nice to realize that he'd boosted his power once again and the most apparent effect of this increase was the incredible boost to speed and the ability to _maintain _that speed for longer.

Of course, his mood was ruined utterly as he observed the small town in front of him. The town itself was quite idyllic, a mansion that was approximately a third the size of Rabier's which was quite modest surrounded by farms and barns, it was a nice place and would have had a simple rustic charm under normal circumstances. The fact that it mostly had demi-humans would have had him applauding the Lord here.

The members of the church that were brazenly walking around town and inside the mansion ruined the view. Adrian shifted his position, moving from the forested region on the outskirts of town to a point _far _above it, and used _Second Step, _a new skill of his, to stand on a platform of SP. His sensory skills told him all he needed to know.

The well dressed Lord of the territory was being interrogated, not brutally but quite seriously, by two people, whom he presumed were the leaders of this expedition of the Church. Five men were patrolling outside and keeping the whole town under control, the demi-human corpses he could see attested to their method, brutal but effective, and another three were inside the mansion guarding the servants who had been corralled into a room.

Adrian noted an anomaly among the servants, gauged their strengths by the gear they were wearing, and then felt his fear rise.

He wasn't scared of these people. Ten members of Church, above level 50 but below level 70, were nothing to him, he could kill or cripple them in less than ten seconds. The problem was the implications of their presence here. It would not surprise him if the Church decided to kill everyone in this town. They had committed genocide, in cooperation with Aultcray in the Seaetto Territory, it stood to reason that they could do it again. But these people were _far _too powerful for that. However, they were just about _perfect _for a squad to kill the 'Shield Demon'.

Or was it just the result of the different situation compared to canon? After all, in canon, the Church had control over all three heroes. Here and now, they probably only had control over Motoyasu, given that he was completely independent and Itsuki was either dead, missing or something. Perhaps they just wanted to get Naofumi out of the way for something.

Adrian couldn't be _certain._ Not yet. But it seemed very likely that Naofumi was at risk. Adrian grit his teeth as he realized the consequences of a dead Itsuki and Naofumi and immediately burst into action.

First, he activated his new skill, _Double Sword,_ which did exactly what the name suggested and created a second sword, a sword which could _also _have a Status Enchantment applied on it. The attack didn't stack but the ability to use two different special abilities and status enchantments were good enough for him. It was something he had received from the Boss of the previous Wave.

Then, he created dozens of Swords and sent them moving towards their targets, _this _time he didn't make the mistakes he had made with Rabier. He didn't show himself and most importantly he wasn't stupid enough _not _to feed the sleeping potion to his sword to get a _Sleeping Sword._

The blades moved towards their targets with immense speed and quickly pinned them down, some of them screamed but most just tried to react. Their professionalism was quite impressive but a quick dose of his paralyzing sword and poison sword destroyed their resistance. Another moment and he had all of the Seals on their body removed with a _Seal Removal _and _then,_ he used his _Cursed Seal Sword_ to bind them all to himself. The final step was to send them all to sleep.

He tried to ignore the discomfort the realization of the fact that he was _using a Slave Seal _bought. It was an irrational impulse. Adrian wasn't enslaving them, just imprisoning them, and they _needed _to be stopped.

He quickly checked on his targets even as he drew out a disc and sent a small swarm of projected swords towards the invaders. Adrian winced a little when he noticed that the mansion had been damaged quite a bit, he had chosen to send his swords through the walls or windows, wherever was most effective, and the study that was being used to interrogate the lord was _badly _damaged since there had been two of them who had struggled a little before being paralyzed. Still, none of them were moving, and the Curse Seals weren't activating either.

Adrian had his projected swords cut through _all _the equipment the members of the church had been wearing and gathered it into a pile. One inside the mansion and another outside. He took the now naked members of Church, observed them through his _Blindsight _to make sure they had no implants, and then had them placed on a disc.

He considered absorbing the equipment, then dismissed the thought.

Best to just remove the risk.

The people down on the ground screamed as the Golden Beam cut across the sky annihilating the equipment that he had drawn up into the sky with a couple of swords.

The townsfolk who had slowly emerged from their homes and the servants and lord who had walked out of the rooms they had been contained in all watched the bodies float up. Adrian spared a moment for them and once it was clear that none of the townsfolk needed critical medical aid, they were either dead or okay, he moved toward the lord of the domain. He needed answers.

The man and his servants flinched as he appeared in front of them using _Dash, _but one look at his sword, which he had deliberately kept in its more recognizable base form, had the lord's eye widen.

"Sword Hero," he said, then bowed deeply, "Thank you very much for your aid. I cannot express my gratitude enough."

Adrian had to admit he was a _bit _surprised to see the lord just _accept _that he was indeed the Sword Hero and not an imposter but shrugged it off. It was irrelevant for now. Still, it was a surprise to realize that the man wasn't injured at all. It would seem that he had arrived _before _they had started to torture the man...or maybe it wasn't appropriate to torture a human. Though killing demi-humans was clearly acceptable.

"You're welcome," he stated, still floating half a meter above the floor, "I'd like to speak to you for a moment about some critical matters."

"Of course," he said, seeming to be completely genuine, Adrian had to respect the man's skill at acting, then hesitated, "but would it be possible for me to have a few minutes to reassure my people and start preparing an evacuation."

Adrian felt a surge of respect for the man but crushed it. He had to be objective here...then again he _did _want to imprison the church members didn't he? Plus, it would help if the man had a positive impression of Adrian.

"Very well," he accepted, "we'll speak again in half an hour. Just confirm two things for me, what your name is and whether or not _they _were here for Naofumi?"

The man's surprise was all the answer he needed regarding Naofumi, the verbal confirmation afterwards was just icing on the cake and he was indeed Van Reichnott.

"Here," said Adrian before he left, he held out two bags that he had drawn out from his Sword. They took the empty bags after a look at Van Reichnott, who nodded, then Adrian placed around ten potions each in them, "the blue one has stamina potions and the red one has healing ones. There are around ten people in town who are injured please use this."

It had been odd to realize that these potions that he had been using from the start were actually pretty rare. He doubted these people had casual access to high-quality potions. Plus, it wasn't like he _didn't _have a reserve of literally _hundreds _of potions.

"Thank you, Sword Hero," he said with a bow, "Not just for this but for defeating the Church's agents...I find it entirely likely they would have burned this town to the ground for heresy had you not intervened."

Adrian said his goodbyes and received thanks again before he moved onto the disc he had floating above the town.

He carefully guided it outside of town, marked a spot for his Portal, absorbed the disc and then triggered his Portal to go to back to his base. He'd have his prisoners deleveled and then contained...they might be useful later. 

_*******************************************************************************************************_

_**Isis **_

Isis could feel Papa's energy flow through the plants at his command, it was fused and modified by the Sword that he was bound to, but it was still _his _and she smiled as she felt its' power. The plants also responded growing rapidly to fill the whole clearing until the vines had _covered _the whole area to the point that it was impossible to see the ground.

Then the plants started to dig as other vines rose up to slowly bind the people her father had bought here. It was amazing to see how the plants were draining, feeding, poisoning _and _watering the people while at the same time _forcing _them to stop moving.

"Father," she asked, "who are these people?"

Isis had been practising her magic while her brother and Raphtalia had gone to help train up the weakest member of their party. She _didn't _understand why Papa thought it was okay to have someone as weak as her in their party but she assumed there was something that he knew about the girl that Isis didn't. Then Papa had arrived using his Portal, she had gone up to him so that she could see him only to find him using the Hourglass to remove the support of the world from some people.

She had not interrupted him while he was working but now they had moved far away from their home and he had started to grow some plants.

Her father turned his attention to her even if he didn't turn to look at her and said, "Do you remember me telling you about a Church in Melromarc?"

She nodded, "Yes! You mean the people who would treat Trystan, Raphtalia and I badly because we aren't human."

Isis remembered them well, Father had told them to fight with full force because they would _not _be happy with the Sword Hero having non-humans as party members. Which was _really _stupid because Trystan and Isis were human _and _filolial.

"These people," he said pointing to the four people who were _surrounded _in vines, including some that were directly inserted into their bodies, "are from the Church and are hunting down Naofumi, the Shield Hero."

Isis nodded, and then frowned as she noted that Fitoria was trying to listen in, she focused her magic and her life force and _crushed _the connection. It was very rude of the other Filolial to listen into a conversation with her Papa. He had taught her that eavesdropping was rude and only to do it in case of emergencies.

Then she paused and considered her situation. Was this an emergency? Isis decided to ask her father.

"Father, is this an emergency situation?" she asked, "Should I let Fitoria listen to our conversation?"

Her father turned around so fast she barely even saw him _move, _"Isis," he said slowly, "are you saying that Fitoria can spy on me using you and that you can _block _that connection?"

She nodded, wondering why he was surprised, it was obvious that the energy enhancement that her senior had provided _needed _a connection.

He patted her head, "You never cease to amaze me," he said, his tone wry, "tell her that the Shield Hero is at risk of being killed and that I'd appreciate it if she could give me more precise directions."

Isis nodded and opened the connection, Fitoria eagerly listened, it was funny how the older Filolial liked to talk but didn't _want _to be seen as wanting to talk. Once she had confirmation from the Filolial she looked to her father who had finished placing all his prisoners in pods and had _buried _the pods nearly ten meters underground.

Her father pulled out a map and gave it to her, "Please ask her where."

"Father," she said, "Fitoria has agreed to help, but she says that she _can't _be very precise. She says that there is a hero somewhere here," she made a big circle on the map, "but something is interfering."

"Ask her if she'll be willing to come with us," he said, "It's likely that this will involve the oddity with the Bow."

Isis tilted her head and winced at Fitoria's response, "She said that it is your job as a Hero and that she wishes you the best of luck."

She felt her fathers mana shift in response. He was worried, Isis blocked Fitoria out of spite, it wasn't nice of her to make father worry just because she didn't want to be sad, "Damn it," he said, "we're leaving right away Isis. Are you ready?"

Isis nodded and then felt the world fall away as her father's skill took them far, _far _away. As they emerged in the outskirts of a small human town Isis couldn't help but feel excited despite the situation and Father's worry.

She was having an adventure with him _alone._ While Trystan had to get bored leveling with the others. Isis would be sure to remind him of this...when Father wasn't around.

He didn't like it when she mocked her idiotic little brother. Papa was too kind like that, Trystan _needed _to be reminded not to do stupid things.

_*************************************************************************************************_

_**Adrian**_

Adrian walked towards Van Reichnott who was speaking to a small collection of villagers. It was fascinating to see that they had already started moving with filolial drawn carriages being used to transport both people and the essentials. He could see that Isis felt a fair amount of disdain towards the Filolails, which wasn't a surprise, she was a _much _greater existence than they were. The filolials, however, were looking at her with fear and awe.

The nobleman turned towards him as soon as he realized that Adrian was here. The villagers looked at him with gratitude and awe but said nothing as they observed their lord and Adrian.

"Sir Hero," said the man, with a bow "thank you for your patience. And who is this young lady?"

"I'm Isis," she said, with blatant pride "I am a member of Father's party,"

The man looked a little surprised but then nodded, "It is a pleasure to meet you," he said, "will she be joining us?"

Adrian nodded as they began to walk towards the mansion, "Yes, she will," he stated simply not giving the man any room for argument.

"I see. Let us go to my stud-" he cut himself off, "I mean my dining room for our conversation. Would you like some particular refreshments?"

Adrian winced internally at the man's mention of his study. It had been Adrian's attack that had ruined the place. Between the hole in the ceiling, the partly destroyed walls and the massive bloodstains the room needed some _serious _renovation.

"No need for any refreshment," he stated, as they reached the room and took their seats, Isis at his side at the head of the table while Van Reichnott sat to his side. Adrian appreciated the gesture, "Let's get on topic. What is Naofumi's situation and how did it get to this point?"

Adrian was a little stunned to find that Naofumi had actually had a pretty good start. Turns out that Andrea's father was a bigger player than he had assumed. The man had intercepted Naofumi on the first day, planted a spy and a bodyguard in one on him, and had removed him from the influence of the Crown and the Church. It made Adrian realize what a bullet he had dodged by leaving when he had, it seemed that the chances of her manipulating him were even higher than he had initially suspected.

Of course, things had gone to hell soon enough, the Church had mobilized after realizing that he was meeting some representatives from other nations. Adrian wanted to scream as he realized the reason for their early actions. The Church, in canon, had never _needed _to move early on in the game because of Naofumi's extreme mistrust and paranoia. He must have refused all the offers outright preventing them from needing to interfere.

Here, the Guild Leader had stopped all of that from the start. Adrian winced at the thought of a more naive Naofumi being hunted with limited allies, even worse it was a coordinated search with the _entire _border being mustered against him. Turned out that while communication technology was limited in this world it _was _possible to send messages to specific devices. The devices were set up in advance. So if a set of four devices were enchanted then they could _only _send messages to those devices, but Adrian could _easily _imagine that alone being used to coordinate a search.

This situation had just gone straight to hell. Even worse, Itsuki was still a problem.

"Damn it," he said, his Sword changing forms to his _Man Slayer Sword, _as he contemplated the destruction of the Church. He ignored Van Reichnott's flinch and continued, "what about Itsuki? Or Motoyasu? Any concerns about them?"

The man gathered himself even though he was still sweating, Isis, on the other hand, looked comforted by his aura, "I'm afraid I don't know anything about what happened to Sir Itsuki. His entire party was found dead but that is the limit of my knowledge. I don't believe anything has happened to Sir Motoyasu."

"All right," he said, "and you don't know anything about where they might have gone?"

"No Sir, I didn't want there to be any chance of betraying their location."

Adrian had to admit he was impressed by this man. But he didn't have time to waste.

"Thank you for the information." he said, offering his hand to Isis who quickly took it "I'll take my leave."

"Sir Hero," said the nobleman hesitantly, as Adrian made to stand up, "there is one more thing,"

Adrian had a bad feeling about this. Van Reichnott had been pretty honest until now...if he was this hesitant about something then it was either a big secret or something that would really, _really _piss him off.

"What is it?" he asked, trying to keep the apprehension from his voice.

He paused for a second before stating, "Our nation is rather...divided. Even the Royal Family has numerous factions within it. Indeed, the main branch itself is fragmented with the Queen and King operating quite differently even as they provide the illusion of unity."

"Get to the point," he stated flatly.

The nobleman swallowed before stating, "The King has declared that you raped Princess Malty." he quickly added as Adrian felt his magic and SP slip out of control, "most agree that you are completely innocent but-"

"Stop," he commanded and Van Reichnott closed his mouth swiftly, Adrian closed his eyes, took a deep breath and then contemplated just capturing thehim. The Royal family was his enemy, _Melromarc _as a whole was now his enemy given that the Church and the Crown were his enemies.

"Father," said Isis, "are you okay?"

Adrian took a deep breath, "I'm fine Isis. Just...surprised."

"Sir Hero," the man attempted to interject, "I assure you that the Queen-"

"I asked you to stop," he said, his voice flat but polite, as he considered his options. The man was quick to shut up. Wise, given that Adrian was honestly tempted to just blast him and leave.

Ideas came into his mind, but the one thought that stood out most was that Aultcray would have to die, and soon. Rape was a serious crime in Melromarc. One that was deserving of death, if a male committed against a woman. In other words, Aultcray had framed him and sought to execute him. _Malty _had either lied to her father and convinced him or she was a pawn in his game. Given Aultcray's reputation in this world and Adrian's knowledge of canon either possibility could be valid.

Either way, given that the Royal Family was potentially his enemy, almost certainly _after _he killed the King. It would not be wise to give anything more away to the Queen.

He glanced at the nervous Lord in front of him and for a moment he was tempted to capture him but his _Blindsight _let him see the nervous people outside, the relief as they realized their nightmare was over and decided to let him be. All else be damned, those people had no protector save for this man and Adrian knew that he was just another nobleman, there were probably a lot of Rabier-like scum, who could give him the information he needed.

"Thank you for telling me," he said, meaning it, this man was quite brave to bring him such bad news, even if he had hesitated and delayed it to the end of the conversation...but if Adrian's guess was right then there was something more that Van Reichnott could help him out with.

"You hinted that the Queen disagrees with the King in this matter." he stated, his voice calm and his magic under control, "tell me more."

The man jumped to follow the command. His fear was meagre comfort.

The conversation ended sooner than the nobleman would have preferred, Adrian barely spoke, but what he learned was telling. He hadn't realized just how divided this country-_no, any _feudal system-was. It was something he could use.

"Thank you," he said, "I'll take my leave. Rest assured I'll do everything I can to help Naofumi and Itsuki."

The man stood up a moment after Adrian did, "Yes Sword Hero," he said, sounding a little relieved that Adrian had calmed down, "I cannot apologize enough for what our country is doing. Thank _You_ for understanding-"

Adrian laughed here and the nobleman was wise enough to realize that something was _wrong _in that laugh.

"Do _not _thank me." he commanded, "I've just set this aside for now because we have bigger problems."

Adrian smiled as he walked out the door, picked up Isis, who wrapped her arms around his neck and then used one of the holes he had made in his initial assault, ignored Van Reichnott's goodbye, to _Dash_ to a position above the town.

He quickly oriented himself using his _Map _skill, "Hold on tight Isis," he said, "I'll be moving at full speed."

She nodded into his shoulder and tucked her wings closer and then they were moving towards the border. 


	32. Chapter 32

_**Adrian **_

Isis was enjoying herself. It was such a little thing but it helped Adrian relax.

They were floating well above a border fortress and Adrian was doing his best to scout it out. Unlike the other three that Adrian had destroyed this one was clearly under high alert. It actually had a barrier of some sort active.

Still, that hardly mattered, Adrian had a full-powered Sword Beam ready to wreck both the barrier and the gemstone array that was its' core. It wasn't going to be a concern.

The Sword Hero noted the food storage sites, the stables where Dragons, Filolials and Horses were housed, the infirmaries and _most _importantly the communication arrays and the areas where the soldiers were located. He wanted to utterly annihilate every one of those areas, save for the last.

It was a little tempting to be through and simply wipe out the whole fortress and the walls that it commanded but Adrian wasn't willing to kill hundreds of people who were nothing more than tools in the hands of their corrupt and foolish masters. He was well aware that he might have _already killed innocents _back in the previous fortresses despite his best efforts, sure none had died when he had been there and he hadn't received any experience notifications from them but he _had _injured a lot of them it wasn't hard to imagine that some of them would end up dead.

The thought was frustrating, but Adrian didn't see any way around it. He _needed _to make sure that he found Naofumi first, the problem lay in the fact that while he had an area he was meant to search that area was _massive. _Plus, while his hunting and tracking skills were quite useful, they weren't as helpful as they should have been. _Someone_, probably the Queen's shadows and several Adventures, had placed _a lot _of false trails.

He could tell that they _weren't _anymore and he hadn't found any of them nearby and really _didn't _have the time to track them down but all this meant that he had basically zero direct leads to Naofumi and he would need a fair amount of time to track him down. Lesser time than almost anybody else, he was sure, but a lot of time nonetheless.

Adrian didn't have any practical options to narrow down his search. He was not experienced at interrogations and after Rabier he _really _didn't want to try it again unless he was in control and had the time to try. Adrian had been so furious at the man that he had effectively killed him before he had fully finished interrogating him.

It worried him that he might be very close to getting killed by Fitoria. If Itsuki died in captivity and Naofumi died today then she had a _lot _of incentive to kill him and Motoyasu. Sure, Isis' ability to block her vision would be a godsend...but that wouldn't be anywhere _near _enough given that she could track him down and find him. He took a deep breath to _stop _thinking about just how dangerous that bird was.

He needed _to focus _so that he didn't have to worry about her. Keeping Naofumi safe was just step one but it was critical.

So, here he was, limiting Melromarc's ability to find him instead. Sure, absolutely ruining the border _wouldn't _stop the people already on the field but it would cripple their communications and _that _would prevent Naofumi from being swarmed. A single squad _should _be within Naofumi's capabilities to counter.

Not to mention crushing a fortress-like this was pretty simple. The first fortress had taken him nearly five minutes to ruin as he carefully tested out that things durability, he wanted to _stop _these people _not _kill them all. The second and third had been over in less than a minute.

This one _might _take a little longer given that the barrier was up.

"I'm starting Isis," he said, his voice a little loud to be heard above the cold, howling wind.

"Yes, father," she said, then closed her eyes and flared her mana. Adrian smiled at the feel of it, even as his mana sight let him see the beauty of it. Akin to a Kaleidoscope bursting from her skin. She looked amazing.

They synchronized their powers and began to chant in unison, "_We command the elements to force the world to be torn apart by the trinity of Fire, Lightning and Wind. Let all between the heavens and earth be brought to ruin. Blade Storm!"_

_Mana Sight _allowed him to see the immense amount of mana flowing in and around the massive structure. Every inch of the border was saturated in mana which was coming from a number of gemstones embedded into the stone that the border was made out of. He made sure that he could see communication rooms, food stores, water storage facilities, literally _dozens_ of Filolials and Dragons and the carriages they pulled, hundreds of men and women and many armouries.

It was quite a sight, and it was one that was almost identical to the previous three, it must have taken a long time to build this defence network.

Unfortunately for them, Adrian had a lot of incentive to destroy this place. Since he couldn't help the Shield Hero directly, the obvious solution was to _destroy _the Shield's enemies.

The thousand blades that manifested around him in less than a second would be his tools...but first.

"_Sword Beam," _he said, his voice barely a whisper, as he held the boosted Sword in one hand, the other carefully holding onto his daughter.

The attack had no recoil. It emerged from the tip of his sword that was pointed directly downwards, right at the core of the defensive barrier. He ignored the existence of the barrier itself, rightly, as it turned out. It simply failed the instant the beam touched it. No resistance, no dramatic moment where the question of '_which one would win?' _came into play.

For the fortress, however, the beam was catastrophic and a huge portion of it was simply _removed. _Adrian kept the beam active for another three seconds before moving it through a _very _small angle. He stopped it only because he would have killed a couple of people otherwise. Though he doubted that anyone down there would appreciate it given that their fortress just had a fair portion of it annihilated.

He could see some of them looking up and then going still as they spied the _hundreds of swords _covered in electricity bearing down on them.

Adrian showed the highest-ranking members, identified by their equipment, no mercy. He smashed half a dozen electrified swords near them and watched with pity as they were electrocuted. The other, significantly less important soldiers, got a lesser dose but they were still shocked slightly even if Adrian made sure to limit the current flow.

His other targets were not so lucky. Adrian had no reason to hold back against inanimate objects and so the communications room, food storages and kitchens, equipment stores, enchantment anchors and most importantly transportation systems were annihilated

Adrian felt a surge of pity for the animals in the stables as they died but he welcomed the experience nonetheless. It was a little odd to kill filolials when he had one in his arms but it was apparently not a problem, Isis' reaction to his question about whether or not she was okay with him killing filolials had been a shrug and nothing more. Her apathy had been a welcome surprise.

It had taken no more than 15 seconds since he had fired the Sword Beam.

He carefully looked around as he gauged their response and condition. Adrian felt an odd combination of satisfaction and horror, a familiar emotion after his fourth assault, as he smelled the smoke, observed the many fires and witnessed the many soldiers who were either unconscious, whimpering in pain or begging for help.

"Done?" asked Isis, while casually observing the devastation below, her silver hair moving wildly thanks to the wind.

Adrian nodded, then double-check to be certain and confirmed, "Done. Ready to go?"

A nod and then they started moving. He didn't go at his full speed, instead, he moved only moderately fast and made sure to destroy the many gemstones based enchantment anchors and rest stops along the border. It slowed him down a bit but it would hurt his enemies a lot more. He suppressed his frustration at being forced to waste time and potentially _lives _like this due to the greed and stupidity of humans.

It took the Sword Hero only two hours to raze most of Melromarc's Eastern border. He still found it unbearably slow and inefficient. Even if most of his time was spent making sure that Naofumi was not anywhere near the border, he hadn't wanted to risk _just _missing the Shield Hero. 


	33. Chapter 33

_Naofumi_

Naofumi walked around the clearing while nibbling on his jerky. The meat was coarse and tasted like salted cardboard but he continued to chew on it despite his antipathy for it. He would need the energy for tomorrow.

Most of his attention was on the forest around him. His party was resting after several hours of constant travel and all of them were quite exhausted. Ethan, Rizwan and Fenral had taken the first watch and were resting at the moment while Mirza and Naofumi himself were currently having a snack while doing their best to maintain security. They were the best choices for the night watch, Mirza with her special eyes that let her see in the dark and his Night Vision that let him effortlessly pierce the gloom around them, but it didn't change the fact that he was still very tired.

He stretched and went through some basic warm-up exercises, trying to get the blood flowing, trying to _avoid _falling asleep. Naofumi's two-hour nap had not been particularly restful and he still felt the need to try and rest. Unfortunately, sleep was yet another luxury he would have to give up until he was safe.

Naofumi had been trying to keep thinking positively but after three days of being hunted he was in no mood for optimism. It wasn't difficult to see that their current plan was a long shot and that there were simply _too _many ways for things to go wrong. Hell, things had _already _gone wrong, what with their Filolials getting killed, Fenral getting injured and the many fights and detours they had been forced to take to keep ahead of their hunters. The past few hours had been a little better in that they had avoided all the patrols looking for them but Naofumi was sure that it wouldn't last long, they would encounter them again and then Naofumi would have to kill again. Not directly, his Shield wouldn't allow that, but at his command.

He wasn't sure if he should feel guilty about it or not. _They _were coming to attack him for no reason, it was their fault and he was well aware that if he didn't fight then it would lead to his death and the deaths of his whole party.

It still felt like he was doing something wrong.

He sighed, and shook his head, before looking at his Shield. Naofumi wasn't sure what to think. His adventure had started off oddly, gotten better and then turned into a trip through hell and it was all this Shield's fault. There was a part of him that was grateful, happy about the chance to have an adventure, to be _more _than just an otaku, but at this moment most of his mind was furious and scared.

He had done nothing wrong and he still had people eagerly sacrificing their lives for a chance to kill him. It unnerved him to remember their fanatical zeal and how they threw themselves at him just to commit murder.

Naofumi shook off his useless thoughts, slapped his cheeks to shake off his sleep, and then continued to keep watch. For an indeterminate amount of time, nothing occurred save for the screeches of the many monsters in the woods and the rustling of the wind.

Then, Mirza moved abruptly, he turned to her in time to see her eyes widen, and point south, "Two signatures. _Extremely _powerful. They're-"

She didn't complete her sentence. She didn't need to, he could see a man just _appear _as if he had teleported, and even Naofumi with his paltry magical senses could tell that this man was powerful. Mirza quickly woke up the rest of his party while he got himself ready for a fight.

To his surprise, despite the rapid initial approach, the man was content to simply walk towards them slowly. The figure, whom he could now see was holding a child in his arms, walked with no hurry. He had a sword at his side, a _familiar _sword with a very familiar gemstone.

"Adrian?" he called out, not lowering his Shield, but a little less wary, "Is that you?"

"Naofumi," greeted the man whose features he could now identify, Adrian's accent twisting the name until it sounded a little odd, "It's good to see that you're safe. I apologize for the abrupt entrance but I have some critical news. Do you have a moment?"

Naofumi wanted to laugh at the absurd man in front of him. He had heard that Americans were supposed to be rude but here was Adrian speaking to him like they were at a business meeting or something. Naofumi turned to his party and found that they were _much _warier. Mirza, in particular, looked to be shaking slightly while Rizwan had a cold expression on his face. Ethan was wary while Fenral was staring at the girl with a snarl on his snout, his broken wings flaring slightly in an attempt to make himself look bigger.

Before Naofumi could figure out what to do Adrian spoke, his voice calm but firm, "I mean you no harm. I'm here _only _to give you some information, some help if you desire it and an offer that you are free to refuse. Give me ten minutes of your time and then I'll leave if you wish it."

Naofumi could tell that his words were directed less at himself and more towards his party members despite the fact that he had been directly addressed. He winced slightly as his Rizwan raised his spear even higher, moving into position.

"Enough," he said firmly, not willing to make an enemy out of Adrian unless he was forced to and he certainly was not willing to have this racist demi-human of all people ruin this meeting. Not when Adrian could be the ace they needed.

Rizwan backed off and Mirza relaxed a little while Ethan who had not drawn his sword simply moved into a calmer stance. Fenral didn't stop snarling, however. His low growl was clearly audible. Naofumi repeated his command and Fenral looked at him, unhappy, but stopped.

"Sorry about that," he said, "we're a bit on edge. What did you want?" Naofumi winced at his clumsy demand, he really wished he had more sleep under his belt. Or at least a couple of moments to plan.

Adrian, however, simply nodded, ignoring his rudeness, "Understandable," he said, "thank you for agreeing to speak to us. I am Adrian Black and this," he said placing the girl, whom he noted had _angel wings, _on the ground, "is Isis. She is my daughter and a Filolial Queen."

Naofumi blinked at the girl and then at the Sword Hero. wondering how the hell he already had a kid, adopted or not. Then shook off the irrelevant thoughts it was the second part of the sentence that mattered.

"Fillolial?" he asked, looking at the girl who was in no way an ostrich-like bird, "What do you...

Adrian nodded before Naofumi could complete his thoughts, "Please transform," he said, looking at the silver-haired girl at his side.

"Yes Father," she said before wrapping her wings around herself and beginning to glow, he was forced to look away as the brightness blinded him thanks to his Night Vision Skill, and when he looked back at her there was a massive three-meter tall bird next to the Sword Hero.

Of course, that made perfect sense, Adrian had adopted a transforming bird girl. He wondered what else he had expected from this absurd world.

Adrian told her to change back which she did immediately and moved back to her human form with her black dress. Then the Sword Hero smiled at them, "Shall we get onto business," he said, making a couple of chairs and a table appear from _nowhere._

Naofumi swallowed as he realized Adrian's tactic. The man had decided to push Naofumi off balance. This whole introduction thing was just so that Adrian had control over the conversation. And the worst part was that it was _working. _Still, he sat down and then introduced his companions as they each took a chair, Adrian sitting directly opposite his position across the small table while his daughter, and wasn't that an odd thought, sat next to him. His own party members were around him. Ethan on his right and the other two to his left.

Fenral was staying _far _away from the Filolial/girl hybrid and was almost hiding away from her. He had been since the transformation.

"How the hell did you do that?" asked Naofumi, unable to help it, he ignored Adrian's annoyed look, "you just made these chairs _appear._"

Adrian erased his annoyance quickly but he raised an eyebrow before answering, "I used the crafting ability of the Sword to make it and the storage space to hold it," he said, "I had assumed that you would have a similar ability. Is that not so?"

"No, nothing like _that_," he said, feeling incredibly irritated, he'd been pretty certain that Motoyasu and Itsuki's initial dismissal of the Shield had been incorrect. Sure it couldn't attack but it could do a _ton _of other stuff. All the skills he had unlocked and his stats were certainly nothing to scoff at...but if the Sword and the other weapons could do _more _than the Shield then they had been totally right to assume that his weapon was shit.

Adrian simply nodded, "I see...we can experiment on that later. Perhaps there are different abilities from weapon to weapon or the conditions for unlocking them are different but I've got some pretty important information to share." said Adrian, "The Four Heroes are part of a system to fight the Waves. We block the Waves both passively, by making the Waves weaker as long as we are alive, and actively, by forcing the Waves to occur less frequently if we fight a Wave directly and as long as _all _of us are alive this system works quite well." He paused for a second and then looked Naofumi dead in the eye, "The problem is that I don't know exactly _what _happened to Itsuki but he is no longer blocking the Wave passively. Something is wrong with either him or his weapon."

Naofumi found that Adrian had answered a question that he had asked before. Why bother summoning all Four Heroes if you _hated _one of them?

"How do you know this Sword Hero?" asked Rizwan, his words polite but his tone challenging, "None of our records have any mention of such a thing."

Ethan looked as annoyed as Naofumi felt at Rizwan's rude statement but Adrian smiled at the demi-human and answered calmly, "Fitoria, the Queen of All Filolials, was my source regarding this matter," he said, before turning to Naofumi, "you can also verify it on your help menu. It should show up there now that you've heard about it. Of course, you can _choose _not to believe me and do your own research. My main concern is to ensure that all of us live."

Naofumi was a little curious about this Legendary Filolial but he focused on his status menu for a second quickly scanned it. It took him about a minute during which he heard Mirza and Ethan ask Adrian something about the Filolial Queen, but he found the section about the Four Heroes and how they create a barrier to restrict the Waves. He sighed as he found the section about the Waves and the Heroes...and then realized that this had _definitely _not been there before. Had it been hidden until he got the information himself?

"Okay," he admitted, "I can see it in my menu but what did you mean by the fact that Itsuki's bow isn't functioning?"

"I'm not _exactly _sure," he stated, his expression becoming even more serious than before "but Fitoria detected that the Legendary Bow is not contributing to the defence of the world consistently. After that I decided to find him but Fitoria _can't _track him so I figured I'd check in on you and Motoyasu first to make you aware and make sure you both were all right...naturally learning that this worthless country decided to have you hunted down changed my priorities."

"Because if we end up dead or if our weapon stops working the Waves get worse." said Naofumi, his voice a little faint as he realized just how important their lives were and that Itsuki was _already _gone.

"More or less," the Sword Hero admitted, "I have no leads regarding Itsuki and I'd hoped to have you or any of your allies help me. Of course," he said with a sigh, "I hadn't expected that they would be stupid enough to try to kill you due to petty prejudices with an apocalypse on the horizon nor had I expected that they would falsely accuse me of a crime simply to have an excuse to execute me."

Naofumi nodded, "You heard about the rape accusation then?"

"Only recently," Adrian admitted, "while I was speaking to Van Reichnott. I'm honestly still quite confused as to _what _Aultcray's plans are but it's pretty clear that Melromarc is my enemy now just as they are yours. I was hoping to work together, it would improve our chances of survival _and _would help us in the future."

"That's your offer then?" asked Naofumi, "An alliance to deal with the Church and the King?"

"Before I learned of our...situation, I wished to extend a mutual aid pact," he said, "Essentially a promise that if things go wrong we help each other if or one of us ends up dead then the survivor avenges the one who ended up dead. That sort of thing. It would force most of the nations of the world to back off and treat us with more caution and less manipulation. I also wanted to make sure that we ally together to fight off the Waves." he paused here to let Naofumi digest his words, "_Now, _I want a full-fledged alliance so that we can pool resources to dismantle the Church, the Royal Family and any of their supporters _and _find Itsuki and whoever has captured or killed him."

That sounded pretty good...if Adrian could deliver. Not to mention that Naofumi himself was hardly in a position to offer anything to Adrian. He was on the run, his allies were limited to three people and a dragon and he had a _huge _number of enemies. Plus, the Church was _his _enemy not Adrian's. Naofumi was hardly an expert politician but this deal was actually biased in his favour. Was Adrian suggesting this simply to make sure that all of them stayed alive? Naofumi hesitated but decided to voice his concerns. It wouldn't be right to keep Adrian ignorant.

"I can't really contribute much at the moment," he stated, "I'm on the run and my Shield stops me from attacking."

Adrian looked a little surprised but laughed a little before smiling, "You underestimate the potential of that Shield. I'm sure that our alliance shall be an equal one if you have a little time to devote to it without the worry of the Church. Plus, it is in my best interests to keep you alive no matter any other factors."

The Sword Hero paused before standing up and waving his sword over the table a small pile of red sand emerged there. His status screen identified it immediately. 

_Dragon Hourglass Sand (SR)_

"Please absorb it and see what you unlock," he said, "that alone shall prove _why _I believe that your contributions to our alliance shall be significant."

Naofumi frowned before gathering the sand and pouring it into his Shield. He wasn't sure _what _to expect but given that it was a _Super Rare _item it was bound to be something epic. 

_Portal Shield Unsealed. (Unlocked at Level 50) _

"Portal...as in teleportation?!" he exclaimed, his excitement coming through.

"Indeed," said Adrian, "it will likely have several limits which I shall _not _discuss here," he said with a pointed glance at Rizwan, "but it will be very useful once you unlock it. The chances of the Church catching you shall basically be zero."

"You already have teleportation," stated Naofumi, confident in his assumption, Adrian would not have known the skills limits without it, "you're past level 50."

He simply smiled and offered Naofumi a party invite. Ethan, Rizwan and Mirza's reactions told him that they had received on as well. He accepted and then checked his status menu. 

_Adrian Black Level 62  
Isis Level 60_

Naofumi stared at the number and slowly started to realize the full depth of Adrian's little strategy during this conversation. He had slowly but surely proven that he could help Naofumi with _all _his current problems. No matter how limited teleportation was it was pretty likely that it could get them out of the country without leaving a trail and take him to a place where he could get some room to breathe and even train. Train until that teleportation was a skill that Naofumi had as well.

Frankly at this point, Naofumi was tempted to accept...but he needed more information. This was convenient, perhaps, _too _convenient. Naofumi would probably have to accept the offer but he could use Adrian's desire to have Naofumi on his side to gain some more information from the Sword Hero.

"What _exactly _do you want from me?" asked Naofumi.

"I _need _you to stay alive," he said, his voice intense, "everything else is secondary. I would _like _for you to help me crush the Church and the King, investigate Itsuki's disappearance and then fight the Waves with me and for that I'd like to take you away from the nations here and into the wilds where you can grow free from their interference."

Naofumi nodded but then caught a glimpse of Rizwan's expression which was cold , the man spoke calmly, "You wish to stop the Shield Lord from entering Siltvelt." the man snarled, his voice furious, "you have no righ-"

"Be quiet," said Adrian, sounding annoyed for the first time in the whole conversation, his aura flared and Naofumi felt a shiver run down his spine, "I only want Naofumi to have enough power to resist the manipulations of _all_ the nations in this pathetic world. Or do you mean to tell me that there are _no _factions in Siltvelt which seek to harm him?"

It was an obvious opening but Rizwan fell for it and was about to speak, Naofumi could tell that Mirza was annoyed by her partner's behaviour while Ethan and Adrian were genuinely irritated. Naofumi moved to stop this debate. It was a pointless one...mainly because he was pretty sure that Adrian was a much safer option than Siltvelt, when both Mirza and the angel girl stood up abruptly.

"Father, _something _is there…" said Isis, pointing, she was about to say more when Adrian narrowed his eyes and said, "_Portal"_

Naofumi realized that the skill took _everyone _in Adrian's party when the world around them all started to waver. He also realized that something had gone wrong very quickly after that. The Status screen made it obvious. As did Adrian's curse an instant later. 

_Portal Blocked._

Adrian moved as soon as the wavering stopped and pulled out a massive wooden disc-like thing before creating _dozens _of floating swords while looking in the direction Isis had pointed at.

"Get on that thing. _Now," _he said as the wooden disc began to float, "Isis if things start to get problematic transform, pick up Naofumi and run. Use your full power, this is not going to be simple."

Rizwan was about to protest when he saw a _massive _swarm of what looked like _Papers _started to surround them. Naofumi got his shield up when he saw that a lot of them were wreathed in elements. Fire, Lightning and even Wind based mana was saturating them.

Adrian barely seemed to react beyond his expression growing cold but his floating swords pointed at the pages and then started to glow. An instant later a huge beam of yellow light, a light that _tore _through the pages and the forest behind them emerged, when the beam faded less than a second later a huge section of the forest they had been in no longer existed.

Naofumi felt a chill run down his spine as Adrian turned to look at them. Any thoughts of accusing him of setting them up vanished.

"This is the man who captured Itsuki. Start running. I'll hold him off." he said, before his expression softened as he turned to his daughter, "be careful Isis and remember that your life comes _first._" Then he vanished.

Isis looked forlorn but she turned to glare at them all, it was quite adorable...or it would have been had her aura not been flaring, "Please," she said, her words polite but her tone cold, as she jumped onto the disc "get on the carrier. We need to leave _now._"

Any argument was quickly silenced after that display of power and they moved onto the disc which quickly took to the air, above the treetops and then started to move away from the fight. Naofumi could see the occasional blast of fire or lightning and a retaliatory beam being fired but he couldn't see much else. The sounds and sights of battle faded and Naofumi relaxed a little.

Until a man with silver hair appeared in front of them, the disc immediately started to move backwards but Naofumi still had enough time to observe their attacker. Three massive crystals as tall as Naofumi himself was floating at his side along with a huge swarm of pages. His appearance was slightly dishevelled but what drew Naofumi's attention was the Book in his arms that had a large gemstone embedded on the cover.

"Two Legendary Heroes for the price of one," said the man before breaking into maniacal laughter, "this is my lucky-"

His words were interrupted as a massive blast of Lightning from Isis struck him head-on. It looked terrifying and Naofumi _didn't _want to imagine getting hit by an attack with that much power behind it.

Unfortunately, their attacker survived it quite casually, a small series of barriers manifested in front of him which blocked the attack, some of the barriers had shattered but most survived.

"How rude," mocked the man, "didn't even let me fini-"

The second interruption was far more impressive as a _massive _beam of light consumed him completely. His barriers shattering like glass and sending him and his crystals flying away while annihilating the pages. The attack had come from their disc which started moving soon after.

Naofumi felt his fear rise as he realized just how dangerous an opponent they were facing. That man had teleported, blocked their portal, created barriers strong enough to withstand an attack that Naofumi and his party could _not _outmatch and had somehow tracked them down. He wasn't sure if this was some sort of betrayal from Adrian or not but the worry and fear on Isis' face after her attack failed suggested that it wasn't...and if it wasn't then this man was probably from the Church.

No, what the hell was he thinking? Adrian had _said_ that this man had taken Itsuki...though he could still be from the church. Naofumi tried to get his head in the game, tried to focus but he couldn't help but feel helpless. That first attack alone would have been enough to take them out if Adrian hadn't annihilated it.

He transformed his shield into the form with the highest magic defence rating and then held onto the platform he was floating in as it headed away from the battle. Feeling quite unprepared for another surprise appearance.

"Get ready," he told his party, "that guy might appear at any time."

They nodded, all of them except for Isis, who said, "Father is fighting him right now he won't escape,"

Her confidence wasn't particularly reassuring. Not when that man had escaped once already. Still, he nodded and took a deep breath, trying to stay aware of his environment and trying not to think of what would happen if Adrian lost and ended up dead.

Naofumi focused his attention on the signs of battle that he could see. The continuous explosions and beams of light that lit up the night weren't very inspiring. Not when it indicated that the battle was still going on. 


	34. Chapter 34

_**Adrian **_

Adrian wanted to curse his past self who had been arrogant enough to assume that his current strength was sufficient. Weeks of killing literally everything he decided was his target in a single strike had conditioned him into feeling like every battle would end quickly and he had developed a number of poor habits.

Habits that this bastard with his Book and the Heroes he had contained within the crystals was exploiting. Adrian was starting to feel incredibly irritated to realize that _most _of his abilities were basically about finding and hitting an opponent as hard as possible.

Adrian's enemy was standing on top of a barrier that he had generated and there were three crystals with Heroes trapped inside them. One of them was Itsuki, whose face was twisting in agony much like the other two boys inside their respective prisons. Their weapons made it clear that they were Heroes but what unnerved Adrian was that there was a constant flow of mana from them towards his enemy.

The Sword Hero summoned a couple of blades and sent them towards his target, who laughed as they splashed against the massive series of barriers he had put up, the fool had learned his lesson after they shattered during his attempted attack on Isis and had decided to set up _dozens_ of barriers in a complex multilayered pattern.

Unfortunately for his enemy the physical collision of the blades was not the most important part of the assault. It was the elemental explosions that they generated.

Barriers shattered and Adrian saw the arrogance get wiped out, fury and then pain replacing it, before space warped and the silver-haired man was teleported from his previous location. Most of the explosion missing him entirely with all traces of damage removed within a few moments of his reappearance.

Adrian didn't miss how the faces of the three Heroes imprisoned within the crystal contorted in pain as the man healed. Nor did he miss the fact that the man's barrier's _weren't _back up yet.

A series of small diameter Sword Beams struck two of the crystals, which started to break down before the barriers were recreated around them...but _only _around them. Adrian focused on the Sword in his hand, a weapon with an attack boosting Status Enchantment combined _with _an Anti-human attack bonus.

The Beam that lanced out annihilated the barriers around the two poor souls contained within the Crystals...and then killed the two Heroes within. His enemy was wise enough to place the barriers around himself and just _barely _survive the attack long enough for the cooldown for his little teleportation trick to end.

"You bastard-" the Book wielder snarled, but Adrian had no reason to let the man continue. _Dozens _of Swords erupted from his one, filling the air around them and forcing the silver-haired man to set up another series of barriers, occasionally trying to send out a couple of pages from his weapon only for them to be torn to shreds by Adrian's swords.

He dodged the attack as Adrian expected and then drew out _two more crystal prisons_ which Adrian had _not _foreseen. He quickly used _Dash _to reposition himself and _Illusion _to place a false copy in his previous location, firing Sword Beams using the projections he had left behind near the illusionary copy.

Adrian looked at the two new heroes, the gemstones verifying their identity, and realized that this man, whoever he was, had _actually _managed to capture a full set of Heroes from another world _before _even starting with Itsuki. He swallowed his nervousness as he realized that he had _no idea _how many such Heroes this man had set aside.

Adrian needed to end this _now. _A battle of attrition would not be in his favour. Long term survival be damned if he didn't kill this man right here and now he would not live long enough to worry about Fitoria. He resolved to kill Itsuki if need be and started his assault again.

A massive Sword Beam, large enough to encompass the man _and _all his floating power sources lanced out, the barriers, powered by all of the victims, held...but only for an instant before they began to shatter. The Book wielder had been wise, using _hundreds_ of small, but powerful barriers.

It wasn't enough and he was forced to teleport out of the way. _Blindsight _let him see what his eyes failed to register, his opponent had lost his arrogance and his rage, his expression only conveyed one emotion:Fear.

It was an intoxicating thing to witness. Even if it wouldn't last for very long.

Adrian carefully triggered his next tactic, sending out sword after sword after sword, it didn't take long for the skies to end up _filled _with them. Each and every one of them capable of detonating. Once he had prepared his little 3D minefield he summoned a dozen projected swords, focused on the ones that he had _already _prepared and fired them.

More than _thirty_ thin sword beams, less than a centimetre across, struck the barriers that his enemy had put up. They attacked from multiple directions, forcing the Book Hero to defend from all sides, the magical constructs didn't last for long and he warped away...right next to a collection of swords which detonated _instantly._

Adrian used _Dash _to position himself a little further away from his target whom had come quite close to his position and made sure to keep moving the disc away from battle. It was out of range of his _Blindsight _but he kept on pushing it away at maximum speed.

That moment of inattention was one his enemy exploited.

The crystals began to glow. The brightness was blinding, and his enemy _warped, _and then emerged in his blindspot with _hundreds _of glowing pages at the ready.

It wasn't enough. Adrian quickly used _Dash _to move vertically _upwards._ The beams of light that the pages launched were dodged. And less than an instant later _dozens _of Adrian's Sword Beams _eradicated _both the pages...and a crystal prison.

Panic set into his enemy's face and Adrian pounced on it, he could tell, from the now-familiar twist of mana and space, that his enemy was about to teleport. Adrian quickly changed some of his floating projections into Seal Removal Swords and sent them towards Itsuki.

With the barriers down due to his enemies own attack _and _due to Adrian's counter, they pierced through the crystal prison and Itsuki without any resistance.

Adrian winced at the clear agony born not from Itsuki's power being drained but from his swords being stabbed into the boy's shoulders but didn't hesitate to activate the blade.

Itsuki, the other Hero and their captor warped away a moment after his blade was activated...but it's effect was still something that managed to work. Itsuki was no longer bound to the Book wielder. The seal allowing for that had been removed.

Adrian changed the Sword even as he pulled it out of Itsuki telekinetically and had it fire on his target from _inside _the barrier he had created. It was his most powerful Sword Beam yet...but his enemy was wise, he used the remaining Hero, who was trapped in her crystal, and blocked the powerful strike before warping away. Leaving behind Itsuki and the now-annihilated Hero.

The Sword Hero felt a massive surge of relief as he realized that he no longer needed to hold back and moved towards his fellow Hero. The crystal had started to fall without the Book Hero levitating it and Adrian caught him and quickly broke him out of the crystal with a few well-placed slashes, a couple of remnants stayed embedded with the boy.

The Book Hero looked furious and was glaring at him.

"I'll kill you," he said, his voice furious beyond belief, "I was planning to _reward _you by letting to become a part of something _more _than just a pillar of a doomed world-"

Adrian let him talk, taking his potions for SP, Stamina and MP. He _needed _them and if this fool was willing to let Isis and the others escape while giving Adrian a chance to recharge then there was no reason to interrupt.

The man was still ranting ten seconds later. Adrian was ready to fight again. He held onto Itsuki with one hand, not having the time to place him elsewhere as the Book Hero drew out another _five crystals. _A series of sword beams were fired and blocked with some sort of barrier.

It didn't shatter.

Adrian felt an incredible unease as he saw the man laugh maniacally from inside his barrier, the five people, the five _heroes, _inside their prisons began to _wither_ and die as _massive _amount of mana surged.

There was a manic grin on the Book Heroes face and he opened his mouth to say or chant something but Adrian had already triggered _Dash _to move _up. _Adrian didn't stop after that until he was nearly three kilometres in the sky.

It saved his life.

From his altitude he saw a _wave _of force push from the madman's position outwards, getting faster _and _faster until it had expanded into a shockwave that had simply _ruined _everything for more than ten kilometres. He noted that the damage was reduced as the distance from the epicentre increased. The trees near the centre were completely turned to dust while those further away were simply torn out of the ground.

It took him a second to realize that Isis must have been in range and another to realize that the wave was _reversing. _Returning to the caster. He used his _Dash _to get a little closer and _Blindsight _revealed the truth.

That hadn't been a shockwave. It had been an expanding wave of _space._ A disruption in the space-time continuum that was meant to push, pulverize and then _drag _everything back to the caster. His fears abated slightly as he realized that he could still see Isis and Naofumi. They were in that odd-looking...bubble, for lack of a better term, injured but alive.

The same could not be said for Naofumi's other party members. Their defences had been _nothing _compared to Isis or Naofumi and they had been reduced to little more than bloodstains. Only their equipment let him identify their remnants.

The _bubble _was odd, opaque and quite...strange looking but his _Blindsight _could pierce the veil around it with ease. He smiled as he saw the utterly _broken _form of his enemy who looked like he had aged up, his bones easily visible, pressing against his skin, and his muscles having degraded badly. The Book Hero was shaking, a furious look on his face as he realized that Adrian had _not _been caught up in the attack.

Adrian didn't enjoy his fury for long. He focused on some of the blades that had survived the attack and were trapped in the odd spatial bubble with the man and simply used them to _tear the man apart. _Isis witnessing the display added to it with a massive firestorm of her own.

She truly made him proud in moments like this.

Then the bubble began to shrink and Adrian realized that killing the caster while his _daughter _was trapped within a magical field of said Casters creation was _insanely stupid._

He quickly changed into his MP draining Sword and launched a Sword Beam at the bubble...only for the attack to simply _appear _outside another point. Hundreds of MP consuming blades did the same as he launched a Hundred Sword attack. Attacks from _inside _the barrier did nothing either.

Isis, who probably couldn't see anything outside the opaque bubble that he was using _Blindsight _to see, tried her best as well from the inside, realizing that she was in trouble.

Adrian launched attack after attack, reducing the already damaged area into an even more thoroughly destroyed ruin but _nothing _worked. He grit his teeth, changed to his most powerful magic negating sword, and then _charged _at the barrier.

To his surprise, he _didn't _end up on the other side of the bubble. Instead, a message popped up. 

_**Legendary Heroes may not invade other worlds. Please step away from the rift leading to 'Dimension A'**_

He barely even had time to react to the message before the bubble vanished. Taking away his daughter.

For a moment Adrian just stood there in the destroyed region that once held a forest, his hands shaking and his mind numb as he tried to think about what the hell was _happening._

He looked at Itsuki, whom he must have dropped sometime during his reckless charge, the boy was bleeding out on the ground, the only living thing in the area. The Bow Hero whom he was meant to protect.

Adrian moved robotically, poured potions over his wounds and force-fed the boy some stamina and nutrition potions. He was done in less than a minute and then he just _stared _at the area where the bubble had been. Where his _daughter _had been less than a minute ago.

"Isis…" he muttered, unsure if she was really _gone. _He used every single one of his sensory skills trying to see _something _that would lead him to his child...he found _nothing. _Then he tried again. And again. Until he was forced to admit that she was not there anymore.

He started to laugh even as tears ran down his face.

He had 'won' that fight. That bastard with the Book had used his last-ditch attack, fueled by the power of _five Heroes, _and Adrian was still here completely unharmed. His preparations had been _successful_, he had defeated a very powerful opponent. He had even managed to rescue Itsuki.

It had only cost him his daughter. 


	35. Chapter 35

Adrian arrived back at his base, near the hourglass using a Portal, the familiar change of environment failing to bother him. Itsuki was lying down in one of his discs, the boy was still unconscious, and while he had no open wounds, he showed no signs of waking up either. The only reason Adrian had even been able to add the Bow Hero to his party had been because of the Legendary Bow itself accepting the request.

It was remarkable, and infuriating, just how aware the Legendary Weapons seemed to be. Infuriating because it implied that his weapon must have been aware that Adrian had been desperate to help Isis...and it had chosen to ignore his concerns and stop him from travelling into the rift.

_Blindsight _let him grasp the area around him and Adrian stopped as he realized that Trystan and the rest of his party were having a meal inside one of the plant houses he had made. He looked at the stone floor of the ruins he was standing on and wondered how he was going to tell the kid that he had either gotten his sister killed or dimensionally displaced.

No words came to mind. There was no excuse, no reason save for his absolute incompetence. Adrian considered Isis his daughter, but what type of father got his daughter killed or thrown into an unknown dimension?

He felt like screaming at something, _anything. _Adrian felt like running away from the kid. From the disappointment and rage that Trystan would no doubt feel but he shook his worthless emotions off and started to walk towards the filolial. If there was anyone who had the right to blame him it was Trystan. The kid deserved to know the full truth.

Adrian tried to figure out what to say. For the first time since he had obtained _Dash _and his incredible speed stats, he didn't use it and instead slowly meandered towards the house his party had chosen to occupy. He had barely moved a few meters when he saw Trystan, in his human form for once, start to run towards him. It didn't take long for Adrian to see the kid with his eyes rather than through his skill and it made him realize something. Trystan had been crying.

"Big bro!" exclaimed the child, as he jumped towards Adrian. The Sword Hero caught him, knelt and held him tightly as the kid did the same. For a long moment, they said nothing more and simply held onto each other.

Then, Trystan leaned away slightly and looked at Adrian, a strange combination of happiness and sorrow, "You're okay!" he said, his voice breaking, "Fitoria said that someone attacked you and sis and that you were fighting and sis was gone with the Shield Hero but you're okay!"

The kid continued to ramble and Adrian let him, holding onto the kid while slowly stroking his wings, until he relaxed a little. Adrian felt his grief rise anew as he realized that this boy had been worried about _him._ Far from blaming Adrian for failing his sister the kid was concerned about him.

It was ridiculous but the Hero couldn't help the combination of guilt and love that rose up. He closed his eyes to try and stop his tears from spilling as he realized anew just how much both his children loved him...and how badly he had failed them.

"I'm sorry." said Adrian, his voice almost a whisper, "I'm sorry I lost her…"

"Big Bro…" said the child uncertainty.

Adrian continued as if Trystan hadn't spoken a word, "We'll get her back," he promised, his tone sharper, "no matter what,"

And he meant it. He _would _have Isis back with them. If she was in another world he would find her and bring her back...and if she was dead then he would resurrect her. He was in a world of magic, a world that had _miracles. _It was about time he used this place properly. 

Adrian looked on as Trystan and Itsuki slept in their respective beds. The Filolial was in his more comfortable bird form while Itsuki who had been force-fed some potions was in one of the first beds he had made using his _Carpentry _skill. It was both reassuring and sad to see the Filolial sleep alone. He had gotten used to seeing the siblings sleep together in a pile.

It was easy to miss Isis. _Everything _seemed to remind Adrian of her.

"Are you okay ?" asked Raphtalia, who was observing him with a frown. Her concern easy to see.

Adrian was tempted to lie, to reassure her that he was okay, but when he spoke it was the truth that spilt from his lips, "I'm not," he admitted, "but I have a couple of plans which I need Fitoria's help with. I'll be better once she's here and I can speak to her."

The Queen had been contacted through Trystan before the child had fallen asleep and she had promised to visit in a couple of hours. That had been nearly two hours ago and Adrian was expecting here to show up soon and he could feel his impatience rise as he wondered what the hell was more important than this. Certainly, he didn't expect her to care about Isis, but Naofumi _should _have been a priority. After all, with a Hero in another world, her little strategy of killing the Heroes at her convenience wasn't going to work. It was the only reason why he expected her to help him.

Adrian saw Rifana and Raphtalia share a look at his answer but he didn't bother saying anything more. He felt more tired than he had ever been but he didn't dare sleep. Not when he had so much to do. Raphtalia opened her mouth to say something when they all saw a bright light wink into existence in the centre of their ruins, a couple of hundred meters from their position. A small instant of time later an ornate carriage had appeared there drawn by a Filolial who was about as large as Trystan, though with different colouration.

Adrian gave Raphtalia a weak smile, thanks for trying to help him, and focused on the one being that could make helping Isis effortless.

Fitoria looked as immaculate as ever and as she walked towards them she changed into her human form between one step and the next. It was a seamless transition unlike the slightly longer transformation that Trystan and Isis had. Another demonstration of her experience.

"Sword Hero," she greeted, her voice intense, much more so than normal.

"Fitoria," he said, and nodded to greet her, "Are you aware of the current situation?"

She nodded, "You found the Bow Hero but lost the Shield Hero and my Heir." she summarized, her voice flat.

Adrian felt a helpless sort of rage rise at the accurate summation along with some surprise as he realized that she _was _a little concerned for Isis. That was a genuine surprise to him, in his eyes, he had assumed that she simply wanted someone to take her place with little regard for who they were. Given that at this point she had access to two other Heroes and Trystan he had expected that she would be apathetic to Isis' loss.

He took a breath before answering. "Accurate," he said, wincing internally at his sharp tone, "can you check on the Bow Hero? I'd like to be certain that he is recovering."

Fitoria didn't bother moving even though Itsuki was fairly far away, she simply glanced in his direction for a moment before stating, "He is recovering and the Bow is functioning properly again but the Hero's soul is strained. It will take him some time to wake up."

"Some time?" he asked.

Fitoria shrugged, "Every soul is different. There is no method to make an accurate prediction about his recovery."

Adrian found that her apathy regarding Itsuki's well being was grating. Especially since it was a pretty good indication of how much she valued _his _life. That she didn't care about his life even when she had no access to Naofumi to reset the Hero summoning was a pretty good sign that she either had something up her sleeve or was apathetic and was just running through the motions. Then again, he had never expected her to care.

"But there is no risk of death," he said, just to be certain. She nodded before taking a good long look at him and then turning to stare at his sword.

"You fought a Vassal Hero from another world." she said, her tone matter-of-fact, "you should have won."

Adrian smiled bitterly, "I should have," he agreed, "and would have if that man couldn't draw power from _ten _different Legendary Heroes."

Even to his ears that sounded like an excuse. No matter the reason, the fact was that he had failed and failed _catastrophically _both from a personal and a general viewpoint. However, even now he didn't know what else he could have done. Certainly, he had assumed that someone reasonably powerful could have taken Itsuki but he had not assumed the skill set that the Book Hero had possessed. Even worse, the man had been able to survive his best attacks, drawn on mana from multiple sources giving him the advantage in prolonged battle _and _could teleport and block teleportation. Had his opponent been a more direct type of combatant there would have been a limited chance of Adrian losing. As it stood the Book Hero had been a nightmare to fight.

And Isis, Naofumi and Naofumi's party had paid the price.

Fitoria's reaction, however, was a surprise, "Nine Legendary Heroes?" she asked her tone surprised for once and Adrian was forced to wonder how much she had witnessed through Isis.

"Fitoria," he asked, "how much of the battle did you observe?"

She frowned but answered, "I saw your conversation with the Shield Hero and the Book Hero's first attack. After that, I saw him use that Spatial Distortion to create the rift."

"You missed the whole battle," he said, his tone flat. It took him no more than a second of thought to figure out _how _that was possible. Adrian had asked Isis to allow Fitoria to observe the conversation with Naofumi so that she could weight in if needed and see that he was trying his best to unify the Heroes she wasn't blocked which meant that, "you can only observe what Isis observed and since she was pretty far from the battle and wasn't able to tell that the bastard had Heroes you couldn't either."

Fitoria looked a little annoyed, but Adrian was not in the mood for it and simply stared at her. It took her a long moment but she nodded reluctantly and said, "I was only able to see a portion of the battle. The amount of mana you were releasing stopped Isis from sensing anything else but...it should be _impossible _for other Legendary Heroes to be in this world."

"Impossible?" he said, thinking of the warning he had received when he had tried to enter the rift, "then how did this guy take Naofumi into his rift? How did he drag _others _into this world?"

She opened her mouth, then closed it again before tilting her head and closing her eyes. Adrian waited. Hoping that she would have enough insight to give him an advantage in case he ever had to face that guy or someone else like him again.

He was disappointed but not very surprised when she continued to keep information from him.

"No one should be able to bring Holy Heroes to other dimensions…" she whispered, she continued to look lost and Adrian chose to interrupt. He didn't have time to waste. Not when Isis could be in the hands of that man. Adrian was _almost _sure that the Book Hero was dead but that was not a guarantee and he didn't want to screw up again.

"What can you tell me about Vassal Heroes and dimensional travel Fitoria?" he asked, getting to the point, "I need to know how to get the Shield Hero and Isis back."

Fitoria looked hesitant but conceded in the end. Probably realizing that it was in her best interests to save Naofumi. Honestly, Adrian was happy that Naofumi was stuck with Isis. He didn't think the currently weak Shield Hero was good enough to protect her or anything but his mere presence in that other dimension was enough reason to get Fitoria on board.

"Vassal Weapons can travel dimensions using the rifts that are formed during the Waves," she started to explain, "they can also take people who are in their parties with them..."

Long story short, only Vassal Heroes and their party members could travel to other dimensions and it was flat out impossible for Legendary Heroes to do the same...except that it was possible. Even worse she could not open a rift herself. Adrian looked at the ancient being in the shell-shaped like a young girl and wondered about how good a liar she could be. It was hard to say, even with his senses, if this girl was being honest or lying through her teeth.

"Will you be willing to go into the dimension they are trapped in?" he asked once she was done explaining the situation, "With your power, you could save them with ease."

Adrian had to admit he was not feeling very hopeful. Fitoria was absurdly overpowered, if she chose to help then Isis was as good as saved, but that was precisely the problem. They just had to hope that she would survive long enough for the right Wave to arrive…assuming that the Waves had access to whatever world the Book Hero had accessed.

He had to stop himself from gritting his teeth when she shook her head, "I cannot go to other worlds," she said firmly, "I have to fight the Waves here,"

"Fitoria," he said, "you are the _only _one who can go. Leave the Waves to me, you've seen that I can deal with them, please." he begged, "you can find and save them-"

"No," she said, bluntly, "Levels are reset when people go to other worlds..."

She continued for a moment after that but Adrian wasn't able to listen past that first sentence. He felt like someone had just shoved him off a cliff. He took a deep breath and tried to calm himself as he realized that his daughter was in a foreign place, possibly at the mercy of the Book Hero at _level 1. _Even worse this ensured that sending a party _without _a Vassal Hero to boost their experience gain was suicidal at best.

"Are you telling me that Isis is at level 1 right now?" he asked, cutting the queen off.

Fitoria looked annoyed before her expression softened after she saw his face. He didn't know _what _he looked like but even this apathetic bird felt some pity for him.

"She is a Filolial Queen," said Fitoria proudly, "and a Queen candidate. She will be fine, have some faith in your daughter."

Adrian wanted to scream at the girl in front of him but resisted the impulse. He wanted to tell her to take her _wisdom _and tear it to shreds but crushed that impulse. She was still his best chance to find Isis and get her back. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes for a second and then looked at the Filolial. Arguing was pointless. She was more powerful than him.

"Can you send people _without _going yourself and then pick them up at another Wave?" he asked, trying to find a couple of options. One was obvious, find another Vassal Hero, he even had one man in mind but the other was this one, have her send people and pray that they would be able to find Isis. It was a last ditch option but the simple reality was that he could not _force _Fitoria to do anything. Well, not without going to extremes.

She looked contemplative but nodded slowly afterwards, "I could...yes I could do that."

"_Will_ you do it?" he asked, not willing to let the conversation meander.

Fitoria nodded, "Yes, but it will need to be your allies."

Adrian suppressed the impulse to ask her why she was so casual about all this. It was clear to see that his assumption about her being concerned about Naofumi was false. It had been arrogant of Adrian to assume that she _wouldn't _have any other options when it came to getting a new set of Heroes.

He nodded, "Then I have two requests," he said, " First, please take me to every Dragon Hourglass in the wilds. I don't want to miss the right dimension...and second, please tell me what the power-up methods for the Legendary Weapons are."

Fitoria paused and for a second she flared her aura, Adrain was certain it was deliberate and if felt suffocating. He ignored it and focused on her, she tilted her head, "Will you fight _all _the Waves?" she asked.

"You mean those centred in the human and demi-human populated regions?" he asked, looking for clarification, feeling a little apprehensive about so openly begging her for power but he had no choice. Even if she said no, it would tell him a _lot _about how much faith he could place in her.

"No, I mean _all _of them," she said and he hesitated for a moment before nodding. It was a bad deal..but he had little in the way of choice. She paused for a moment and observed his sword, "you already have a lot of enhancement methods...I'll give you _one _more." she said, and then proceeded to tell him how various things in his item storage could be used.

For a moment Adrian considered arguing with her, but he paused and then thought things through. This was proof that she had no interest in giving him power unnecessarily no matter the circumstance. As things stood now he was more than able to crush the Waves...there was no reason for her to bother powering him up further. He crushed his annoyance, rage and frustration and accepted her intructions. He was certainly not opposed to fighting the Waves...even if he _hated _the idea of serving Fitoria like a loyal dog.

He had slipped the leash that Melromarc had sought to place on him only to fall into the service of this being.

Adrian suppressed his emotions and tested out the system as quickly as he could and found that it was a real method but his satisfaction was quickly cut down as he realized just how massive the number of materials he needed for this system to work. Using this method would need _megatons _of monsters. _Waves _worth of monsters. Powerful, but only in the long run.

What a cunning little monster.

"It's working," he said, politely, the words feeling like they were being dragged out, "thank you"

She nodded and then started to lead him to her carriage. He stopped her and asked her to take his party and Itsuki with them. He needed to be safe and while it was unlikely he would like to be certain that Kyo or another wouldn't be able to kill them. Fitoria would take them to the Waves she normally dealt with but he would be responsible for registering for the other Waves.

Her acceptance was a positive piece of news but Adrian couldn't help but feel furious at the Filolial in front of him. She had lied to him multiple times in this conversation and forced him into a deal that was quite unfavourable. He didn't know _what _she was lying about or what she was keeping from him but he could tell that she _was _lying. There were _some _positives and he certainly hadn't expected for her to give him _all _the power-up methods...but this was not right.

She was risking Naofumi's life. His _daughter's _life for her agenda. It was something he should have expected and it sparked a fire in him as he realized that he needed a counter to her soon as well as a Vassal Weapon Wielder who would serve him _and _he needed to register for every single Wave around civilization.

Adrian sent a silent apology to Motoyasu and Itsuki as his plans began to crystallize. They didn't deserve what he was likely going to have to do to them. 


	36. Chapter 36

_**Naofumi**_

Naofumi winced as he stood up slowly, feeling incredible sluggish, and shook his head to shake off the remainder of the dizziness. The teleportation had been seamless but the landing had _not._  
He saw the angel girl standing up, her hair and dress in disarray, and looked away as she shot a massive bolt of lightning at the corpse with a grimace on her face.

He glanced around, studying the area, and found the contrast between the shattered and ruined earth that had been teleported with them, a result of the spell their enemy had cast _and _the attacks that Adrian had used to try and destroy the bubble, and the beautiful plains that they had been teleported into, to be amazing but his mind didn't linger on this for long.

The Shield Hero's eyes found the remains of his party.

For a long moment, he didn't want to believe what he was seeing. Ethan's armour was twisted and he could see the pulverized remains of his friend inside the steel. Rizwan and Mirza who were less armoured and had been crushed, reducing them to little more than bloodstains and broken bones, while Fenral, who had the least level among them, had nothing left of him.

Naofumi looked away from the remains and felt a burn in the back of his throat. He swallowed the urge to vomit and turned towards Isis who had been carefully looking at the charred body of the man who was responsible for killing his party. The rage that rose up was a surprise as was the cold satisfaction that manifested.

"Shield Hero," said the girl, her tone urgent, "can you absorb this man?"

Naofumi felt a little surprised at her request and the urgency behind it. He walked towards her, wincing at every step as the wounds on his body triggered some pain, dodging the pieces of wood and rock that was scattered around the field they were in.

He glanced at the corpse and then looked away as he realized that it had been _melted _and was quite horribly deformed at this point. It drew attention to the pristine-looking book that seemed to have been completely unharmed by the attacks on its wielder. Naofumi's eyes started to water as the smell of ozone and burned flesh entered his nose. He pinched his nose shut and then turned towards the girl.

"Why do you need me to absorb _that?" _he asked, feeling quite odd at the thought of letting that guy into _his_ shield.

"We didn't get any experience for killing him," she admitted, looking surprised that she had to explain "he _looks _like he's dead but…"

"Got it," he said, and knelt beside the corpse, before willing it to absorb the man. Barely an instant later the body was gone and the book was left behind. Naofumi ignored the messages that came up thanks to the absorption but found himself frowning. This didn't make sense. He couldn't absorb living things and if this guy had died then they should have received some experience.

Naofumi opened up his status menu and then just...stopped moving. He shut the screen and then opened it up again.

_**Naofumi Iwatani Level 1  
Isis Level 1**_

This...this made no fucking sense. He quickly checked on his shields and then winced as he realized that most of them were not accessible. His stats seemed to be pretty high, so he guessed that his bonuses from his mastered shields were still there but he didn't have access to a lot of his Shields and their special abilities.

Naofumi looked towards Isis and opened his mouth to speak to her, he wanted her to check her status screen and verify what he had seen, but found himself staying silent as he saw the Book floating and glowing as it circled around the transformed Filolial.

"I see," she whispered, "you were enslaved,"

The book glowed, almost as if it was responding to her words, and then suddenly stopped glowing and began to float in front of her. Isis held out her hands and it flew into it before glowing one last time.

She looked sad as she stared at the Book in her hands, "I won't hurt you as he did," she said, her tone firm, "but I'll need to go home soon. Father will be sad if I don't."

Naofumi didn't interrupt but he had to admit that Isis looked a little crazy. Thing is the gem embedded in the cover of the book seemed to glow in response. He was pretty sure that the book was a weapon like his was. Naofumi stared at his Shield wondering if it could speak as well.

"Really?!" she said, looking stunned and happy, "Thank you!" she turned towards him, "Shield Hero," she said, her tone pleased, "this book can take us back to our world as long as we find the right rift during a Wave."

Naofumi just stared at her. For a second her words failed to register. Then their meaning hit him like a meteor.

"We're in another world," he said, his tone flat, sounding like a statement rather than a question it was.

Isis looked puzzled at his confusion, "Yes, of course," she said, "that's why the world isn't supporting us anymore."

Naofumi started to ask what she meant by that before he realized that she was talking about _levels._ Support of the world? Is _that _what levels were? He shook off the useless thoughts. This was not the time for a deviation.

He took a deep breath, ignored the concerned frown on the face of the girl in front of him, and then exhaled loudly. Another world. He was in another goddamn world. How the fuck was that even possible? He turned towards his allies, looked at the bright blue sky, and then back to the girl. He had no idea if she was being honest but..the data fit. Had his level not been reset then he could probably assume that she was lying but after being inside a weird spatial distortion he had little reason _not _to believe her.

Naofumi walked towards his companions and knelt down at their side. Isis followed him, for a couple of long minutes she didn't say anything and Naofumi just looked at the remnants of his allies.

"I don't know what to do," he admitted, not sure if he was talking to himself or to the girl standing behind him, "I don't know what type of traditions they have in Melromarc or in Siltvelt." he laughed, a bitter sound.

"You can store them in your shield," she said, "and then-"

"I'm not absorbing them," he said, turning towards her swiftly and glaring at her before wincing as his wounds started to sting again. He ignored the pain. The shield made it easy to tolerate...and it felt like he deserved it. What sort of Shield didn't manage to protect people_?_

She shook her head, "Not absorb them to power up your shield," she said, "just store them so that you can take them back to our world. Father could store _everything. _Your weapons are almost the same, though yours is much, much weaker, so you can do it as well."

Naofumi wanted to tell her to shut up. That she was wrong and that his useless little shield couldn't do half the shit that Adrian''s sword could do...but there was a part of him that _wanted _her to be right. That wanted to be able to lay his party members, his _allies _and friends, to rest. So he focused on his shield and tried to find a storage function. He remembered how Adrian had somehow managed to store furniture in it and tried to imagine a box inside his weapon that he could place things in.

After a long minute of concentration, he opened his Status Menu and looked for a storage function. When he found it he felt a curious lack of surprise. Maybe it was because he had half expected it to be there now that he wanted it to be there. Naofumi remembered well how the help menu had updated itself _after _Adrian told him about the Four Heroes being needed to create a barrier around the world. This was similar.

Naofumi moved towards them, muttered an apology, feeling horribly disrespectful and absorbed them. For a long moment, he stared at the empty spot, the blood that was still spread across the ground and tried to suppress the wretched feeling. Then, he got up and turned to Isis who was standing by. He felt a surge of guilt about snapping at her before when she had only tried to help.

"Sorry," he said, his voice low, "I didn't-"

"It's okay," she said, as she turned towards the forest he could see on the edge of the fields they were in, "but we should go there are some monsters coming towards us and we're weak right now."

Naofumi looked at the blood all around them and then nodded and then followed her as they moved. It was inevitable that this mess would attract predators and he didn't want to face a huge swarm at level 1.

Once they moved out of the ruined area they had arrived in, the world around them seemed to be bright and beautiful. He preferred the devastated area, this place felt like it was mocking the deaths of his companions. 

Kyo Ethnina tried to scream but produced no sound as he had no body, but his _soul _was in pain as it twisted and warped to adjust to his new body. It was akin to placing a square block into a circular hole smaller than the square if he wanted it to fit _something _would be lost.

In this case, that something was aspects of himself. Kyo wished that he could purge his most recent memories. He didn't _want _to remember the cold expression on the face of the man who had _murdered _him without mercy. He didn't want to remember the pain of being struck by attack after attack by an unrelenting monster.

But he was not that fortunate.

Kyo cursed the bastard that had killed him as memories of both his childhoods slipped away from his grasp. Were he not feeling like someone had set his skin on _fire, _he would have tried to hold onto his memories, his thoughts, his _desires _but he felt them vanish even as he tried to grasp them.

It was like trying to hold smoke in a clenched fist. Impossible.

Soon he lost track of everything except the pain, he wanted to hold on to himself, to _fight _for his soul but he barely knew what was happening. He didn't even _know _what he was losing.

It was sometime later, an eternity or an instant he wasn't sure, that he opened his eyes. For a second he felt fear rise up before his mind asserted itself and he relaxed. He was in his laboratory.

He was safe.

Then, the pain hit again. This time it was his nerves starting to function in his new body rather than his soul adjusting to its' new shell. Kyo _relished _in the pain. It proved to him that even _death _couldn't take him. Not forever.

Kyo focused his mana and smiled as it responded as it always had, and then reached for his book. For a second he felt nothing and then he _screamed, _his vocal cords producing a hoarse sound as they were used for the first time. He felt his body start to shake as the mana from the book seeped through his body and began to _rip it apart._

_Not like this, _he thought, as he mustered his mana. _He would not die like this!_

It took him several long minutes and every fragment of his mana that he could gather but he managed to suppress the mana from the Vassal Weapon. Kyo grit his teeth as he got off the platform that his body had been stored on, the glass dome covering it moving out of the way, and stood up on unsteady legs.

"Initiate Wildfire contingency," he whispered, the well-designed system, forged thanks to his genius activated instantly. He smiled, his lips struggling to form the expression, as he _felt _the foreign mana leave his body.

It was only then that he realized what had occurred, his smile vanished, and he looked at himself. He was bereft of his Vassal Weapon. Kyo reached out for it again, half expecting the pain to start again, but was instead met with _nothing._

"Damn it, damn it, DAMN IT," he screamed, ignoring his aching throat, as he realized that his weapon had been stolen from him. Just like his tools had been. He remembered that brat with wings whom he had seen before his spirit had been summoned back to his lab and then continued to curse.

He knew exactly what had happened. Kyo was no fool. He knew that the blasted book had taken advantage of his temporary vulnerability. It had cursed him and then left. Leave _him _for that useless girl who hadn't even been able to scratch him!

That bastard and the brat had taken everything away from him. Kyo grit his teeth as he walked towards the core of his lab, he cursed the bastard who had robbed him of his strength, killed him and then had proceeded to take _his weapon._

"I'll kill you...," he muttered, as his defences analyzed his soul, and then disabled themselves, "I'll take everything from you and kill you…"

Kyo shuddered as he remembered the unrelenting Hero who had no strategy, no skill, _nothing. _That piece of trash didn't _deserve _his power. He had just gotten lucky to end up with a Legendary Weapon. Kyo was certain that the sword bastard didn't even know how to use it properly.

The former Vassal wielder cursed as he stumbled across his laboratory and moved towards the most secure location where three crystals floated. He touched the alchemic array root that was responsible for containing them and then muttered, "Omega Composition,"

For an instant, nothing occurred, then he began to laugh as pure _power _ran into his new body and it corrected itself. He smiled as he saw the three idiots whom he had captured whimper as he drained them of power that they had never _earned _but his mood soured as he was reminded of the monster that had murdered him.

He clenched his fists and then stared at the Legendary Hero of Blunt Weapons, he was nothing more than a tool, Kyo had hesitated to use these three, he didn't want to destroy this world, after all, he had spent a _lot _of time establishing himself here...but that scum had reminded him of just how unfair life was.

Kyo had started with _nothing. _He had been forced to earn every scrap of power and that fucker had ruined _two years _of preparation, but the only reason why that idiot had managed to defeat him was that he was using a Legendary Weapon that was more powerful than normal. Kyo had never used one directly because of the defences preventing them from being used making it risky.

It was time to change that. He would use their power directly and then go back to that world and _kill _that bastard. Then he remembered that he didn't have his book. That it had been stolen from him.

The Hero corrected himself, as he focused on the Weapons and used all of his stored mana in the array, slowly but surely suppressing the Spirit in the Weapons, he would _first _kill that girl who had taken his weapon, then capture that Shield Hero and then he would go to their world and kill the bastard who had spat on his efforts.

His face twisted into a malicious smile as he imagined the despair on that bastard's face as Kyo took _everything _from him. He desperately tried to ignore the part of himself that was _screaming _at him not to face that monster again.


	37. Chapter 37

_**Malty**_

Malty strode through the hallways of her castle dragging Motoyasu to her father's study. The rhythmic sounds of her boots slamming on the carpet were the only thing heard. The servants scurried out of her way. The Spear Hero didn't dare protest the rough treatment, not when he had seen her fury, it was an island of contentment in the middle of simmering fear.

"Calm down Myne," he implored, wincing slightly as they brushed past a pair of Knights guarding the doorway into the private quarters of the Royal Family, the two poor women had been pushed aside roughly.

Malty turned to stare at the fool for a brief moment. Hating the fact that she might _need _this man. If what she had heard was true then she could not afford to alienate the Spear Hero.

"I'm sorry," she said, the apology tasting like vomit, "I'm just a little worried."

The Spear Buffon smiled widely and then thrust out his spear, the Legendary Weapon looking like a child's toy and said, "Don't worry about that bastard. He'll never touch you again!"

Malty wanted to smile and agree. To simply give him a kiss on the cheek and make him swoon but it felt like a joke. A cruel one. Motoyasu was only at level 39 despite her best efforts and she was more than wise enough to see that Adrian, even at level 30, had been _far _stronger than him. She had tried to think otherwise but Motoyasu was slower, weaker and had lower stats and he didn't listen to her when she tried to have him do all the strange things that Adrian did. Things that _worked._

Controlling this man was a bittersweet victory.

She smiled anyway, "Of course," she said, ash in her mouth, "thank you Sir Motoyasu,"

The man grinned and began to boast. He only stopped once they arrived at the study. Malty let out a breath she hadn't known she had been holding. The wooden door that sealed away the room from the rest of the castle was one she was very familiar with. Her father had always been the one to comfort her when Mother had been cruel.

Malty knocked, "Father." she said, "It's me."

The door swung open as the magic that protected her father's personal space unravelled. She walked in with a quieter Spear Hero. Malty revelled in the silence. She knew that it would not last very long.

Her father was seated on his comfortable chair. Unlike the ornate, but uncomfortable throne in the Audience Chamber this particular enchanted furniture was meant to allow father to stay seated for hours on end and work in peace. He had permitted her to sit there once in a while but he was quite protective of it. The rest of the room was filled with books and various magical artefacts that her father studied and used, she knew that he _loved _to take his breaks by studying them and then trying to replicate and modify them. It was something she had seen him do a hundred times. Many afternoons had passed when the two of them tried to unravel what an artefact was meant to do and then make another that did it _better._

But Aultcray Melromarc wasn't relaxed right now. The man that was seated at his desk seemed much older than the father she was used to. His hair was in disarray and his clothing no longer looked as immaculate as it normally did. Certainly, it was clothing worthy of court but it didn't feel that way. An unmistakable taint of exhaustion hung around him like a heat haze.

"Malty," he said, a small smile emerging, "Sir Motoyasu. Take a seat."

She swallowed her fears and sat down on a much less comfortable seat. Aborting her motion to go and kiss him on the cheek. His smile had faded and his expression was like death.

"Your Majesty," said the Hero, his voice excited, and sat down after he received a tired nod, "what's this about? Have you found anything about Adrian?"

Malty wanted to tell him to stay quiet. This was not her father he was speaking to but the Wise King, the Seven Star Hero of the Cane. He had no right to speak to her father so casually but before she could even consider saying a word her father glared at him.

Motoyasu looked stunned for a moment before laughing sheepishly, a hand rubbing the back of his head, he looked a little confused, "I'm sorry," he said, looking to her. Malty looked to her father whose face softened as he looked at her.

"The Sword Hero has emerged from hiding two days ago," he said, without preamble, fury and fear in his voice, "He has destroyed large portions of the Eastern border and then proceeded to vanish again."

Malty felt a momentary confusion before she realized that the Eastern border was the one that faced Siltvelt. After the war, to reinforce their most critical border, the Queen and her father had commissioned hundreds-no, _thousands-_of architects, enchanters, masons and slaves to build the greatest defence that they could. It was no easy task to raise such a massive edifice and she knew that enchantments took _exponentially _more energy the larger the volume they had to cover. That border had been a masterpiece in more ways than one. A promise of safety. An _expensive _promise.

She moved to say something, _anything _but before she could figure out what to say he moved a small viewing crystal from the edge of his desk to the centre and sent a tendril of mana into it. A moment passed when nothing happened before the image was projected in front of them, above the desk.

Any words she wanted to say were stolen from her.

The images were a collection of fortresses that had seen better days. Massive tears in the sides of the buildings, damage on the ruined walls that was created by fire or lightning was visible in every frame. The structures she was looking at were nothing more than the remnants of the fortifications that her father had been so proud of. The destruction was absolute. There were areas where the walls had simply been annihilated, other places where the bedrock could be seen after something had scrapped off the building and foundations above it.

The worst part was how every fortification was more destroyed than the last. The first few images showed signs of _something _remaining but the last set of images were nothing more than empty broken ruins in place of their greatest defences.

"Casualties have yet to be confirmed but we are expecting hundreds of our people lost due to this unprovoked assault," said Father, his voice was flat, almost monotonous, "He also made it a point to injure the commanders of our forces more thoroughly than the others."

"He's a monster," said Motoyasu, gripping his spear tightly, "how could he _do _something like this? "

But Malty focused on her father's words. Adrian had sent her a message. The leaders of most of the outposts along the border were nobles. Normally no scion of a Noble House would be content to spend months if not _years _on the border but when it was the first line of defence against Siltvelt? Then it was an honour and an obligation that every family was expected to contribute towards. The forces stationed there had been a combined army with every noble house, her family and the Church having supplied soldiers. Killing hundreds of them and destroying their pride was nothing short of declaring war on Melromarc as a whole.

It should have been a ridiculous idea. No one man could defeat a nation. Malty looked to her father, who despite his incredible power hadn't been able to destroy the nation he hated. It should have been reassuring but her body felt light like someone had torn out her heart and replaced it with a void. Her thoughts were disjointed and Motoyasu's empty boasts felt like mockery.

"What do we do Father?" she asked, her voice distant to herself.

Aultcray looked at her. His fatigue erased by determination, "We shall show him the consequences of opposing Melromarc." he said firmly, his voice grounding her. He turned towards the only other person in the room, "Sir Motoyasu." he said, a whip-like quality in his voice, "I charge you with my daughter's safety. You will escort her to Lady Roma's house and do _everything _in your power to protect her. Understood?"

He ended his sentence with a question that was a command.

Motoyasu nodded before he even realized what he had agreed to. For once he didn't boast. Malty wondered why she felt horrified by that when she had begged the Gods for him to shut up yesterday.

"Good," her father said, his voice becoming kinder, "Lady Roma has the greatest defences our country can muster. I will also have some of my best stay with you. You will be safe there."

For a moment she could see him thinking of saying something more but he simply shook his head and smiled at her. Malty had several concerns. Lady Roma was one of her _mother's _allies. One of her most powerful. She had visited the old woman before. Her son had been a nightmare to deal with...but she couldn't deny that their castle had the most potent defences she had ever felt. Even Malty with her excellent sense for magic hadn't been able to sense the full depth of their defences. But when she decided to ask him about her worries, he spoke, preempting her thoughts.

"She has agreed to shelter you," he said, with a tired smile, "and has sworn to treat both you and the Spear Hero as guests. I promise you that you will be treated appropriately. Do not worry...just try to be safe."

Malty nodded. Her mind felt empty and yet there was a weight on her chest. She felt tired even though she had just woken up an hour or two before this meeting.

Her father got up and both she and Motoyasu followed. He moved around the desk and hugged her. Malty returned it without thought, thinking back to simpler days, before she froze, glanced at Motoyasu, wondering what her father was thinking, doing something like _this _before another.

"Father," she said while attempting to leave his embrace, but he just held on tighter for a long moment before letting go.

"Good luck Malty," he said, "I'll see you as soon as this situation is dealt with. Remember to keep training and be _careful._"

"I will papa," she said, trying not to think about how final the words sounded.

She failed.


	38. Chapter 38

Fitoria tapped her fingers on the armrest of the seat. She was happy with the well-cushioned seat having _just _the right shape to lean back while keeping her wings comfortable. However, despite her carriage having been transformed into its fastest form for aerial transport, she was impatient.

She observed the newest Sword Hero and wondered why she had stopped compelling the Heroes to deal with the Waves. Fitoria knew that she had done so in the past but she couldn't remember why she had stopped. When the previous sets of Heroes had been summoned she had commanded them to fight some of the Waves while suppressing most of them by herself even though she had been annoyed by it.

This Sword Hero was the strongest Hero of his generation. It was like this sometimes, with one Hero standing above the rest, and she preferred it this way since she only had to tell the strongest Hero to get the others to work properly. This time was a little odd though. She had never seen a Vassal Hero who could take Legendary Heroes across worlds. Still, she knew that the Book Hero wasn't very strong. It was likely that he had a Vassal Weapon that specialized in fighting Legendary Heroes. Even _then _it was better than whenever two or more Heroes were equals. It was always annoying once they started fighting.

Fitoria had to kill the entire set whenever that happened. They never listened to her when she asked them nicely to stop.

This Hero didn't like listening to her either but he obeyed even if it was only because he was scared of her. That was enough. She didn't think he would stop being scared of her for as long as she was stronger than he was.

Heroes were never stronger than her.

Fitoria frowned as she considered that. He wouldn't listen to her if he was consumed by a Curse.

She turned her senses on to him. For an instant, all she could see was what her mundane senses allowed. He was sitting stiffly in his seat with Trystan seated on his armrest, his head on the Sword Hero's shoulder. The Hero had his eyes closed but she knew that he was awake. The Racoon girl was sleeping in another large seat with the other demi-human. The Bow Hero was lying down right next to the Sword Hero on a seat that had been pushed back to form a makeshift bed. Her senses expanded and she felt his mana and the mana of the spirit of the Sword fused like two halves of the same coin. Fitoria focused for a second to filter out all the other sources of mana, that of the sleeping girl from the pacifier bloodline, the other demi-human as well as Trystan.

The first thing that struck her was how content the spirit of the sword was. Despite his anchor taking steps towards the Curse Series, it was pleased. As if it had eaten a delicious meal and was resting out in the warm sunlight. The Hero himself was not calm. Anger and worry were vividly visible in his aura but even as she observed, the rage was leashed and determination replaced it. Occasional spikes of despair rose but were suppressed, not erased, but pushed away for the moment. Fitoria considered him for a few minutes longer, trying to see how many steps this Hero had taken towards the Curse Series, and found that she had little to worry about. The Hero still had hope. That was enough for now. But she was not willing to risk giving him more power, even if he would need it for the later Waves until he had fully regained his equilibrium. She was tempted to do that so he wouldn't bother her and would crush the Waves and deal with the Protective Beasts when they awakened but stopped herself. It wouldn't be right.

Her duty was a burden she _hated _her master for.

Fitoria pushed away her esoteric senses and the guilt of thinking badly of her master and returned to the mundane world. The world settled and she saw the sleeping Racoon Demi-human who was leaning against the other girl who was awake and looking out the window, fascinated by how the clouds were being pushed away. The Sword Hero didn't react to her observation and his son was simply sleeping after having tired himself out after spending hours alternating between enjoying the view and worrying about his sister.

Her Vassal Weapon sent her a warning as they neared the next Hourglass. Much like the previous 30 or so this one was also on a continent that humans and demi-humans had not set foot on in hundreds of years. Even the previous Heroes had been unaware of it. Fitoria suspected that she had been the only person who had even bothered to come to this place and if the Hero did his job properly then she wouldn't have to come here again.

The thought was a relief. She tried to ignore that. This was only a good way to prepare the Hero for future Waves.

"Sword Hero," she said. The Hero opened his eyes, looked her way and then observed the door she had opened. He nodded at her before slowly pushing his son off of himself and then moved towards the door. He didn't pause as he stepped outside of the carriage and continued to walk on the thin platform made out of mana. A long moment of observation, with various skills, later he activated his high-speed movement skill.

It was a familiar set of events and the annoyance she had felt due to his long, unnecessary inspection had faded into oblivion a couple of seconds after he left.

Fitoria tracked him as he moved and waited for several moments. She could tell that he had used a set of attack skills but it was only when he registered with the last Dragon Hourglass on this continent that she smiled. With this, the Hero had been bound to all the Hourglasses on this continent and most of the Hourglasses on the main continent.

The Sword Hero reappeared in the carriage and she quickly activated her portal. Directing it towards the only Hourglass far from the continents. Fitoria felt her irritation spike as her Portal was redirected and pushed away.

"What was that?" asked the Hero, as he held onto Trystan tightly, making sure that the boy didn't fall as the entire Carriage shook.

The demi-humans held onto each other and their seats and so were fine as well and relaxed once the shaking stopped but the Bow Hero, who hadn't needed any support until now since the carriage had been travelling through a corridor of isolated space preventing any shocks or interruptions, fell onto the floor. The Sword Hero got up, made sure that Trystan was seated carefully, and picked the Bow Hero from the floor and put him back into his previous position.

"Fitoria?" he asked after he was done. This time it was directed at her rather than it being an empty question. She could sense that he was preparing for battle.

She glanced at him before shaking her head, "Don't worry." she said, as she reached out to the Water Dragon whose barrier had interrupted her, "We are not in danger."

The Sword Hero looked sceptical but she put him out of her mind as she felt the Dragon Emperor's fragment respond. Fitoria tried to keep her disgust for the _thing _away from her mind. The Water Dragon was the only Dragon she knew that had _deliberately _accepted a fragment. She didn't know why anyone would be willing to live such a hollow life. To exist for a short time and then have their soul consumed one small fraction at a time.

**[Query: Emergency?]**

Fitoria frowned but used her Vassal Weapon to answer. She ordered him to remove the barrier and allow her access to the Hourglass.

**[Denial: Legendary Spirit Implement Not Permitted]**

Fitoria flared her power and aimed the cannons on the outside of her carriage at the barrier and waited.

It didn't take long.

**[ .]**

Fitoria dismissed his concerns. This dragon who had not known anything but enslavement to a fragment had no right to speak to her. She followed the flow of the Dragon Veins to the Hourglass.

"Sword Hero," she said, opening the door, expecting him to move out as he always did. Instead, he stayed seated and raised an eyebrow.

"What happened Fitoria?" he asked after she tilted her head in response, "what was that shock?"

"A barrier made by the Water Dragon," she said, wondering why his senses hadn't detected that, she knew he had Mana Sight and FarSight.

"A barrier powerful enough to block you?" he asked.

She shook her head, "No," she said, "just enough to divert the teleportation. It was removed after I told it to remove the barrier."

"Is it safe?" he asked, "Is the Water Dragon an enemy?"

He didn't know about the Water Dragon. Fitoria frowned as she turned towards the girl with the Pacifier Bloodline. She could tell that the Racoon was untrained but Fitoria had no doubt that this girl was of the main line. The blessing needed to use the Sakura Lumina was present within the girl. Was she truly unaware?

"Ms Fitoria?" asked the Pacifier, her voice hesitant.

Fitoria shook it off. None of this mattered.

"It is safe." she said to the Sword Hero, "the Water Dragon will not fight you."

And he wouldn't, especially since he was on the other side of the country, even if he did, she would blast him.

The Sword Hero stared at her for a long moment before nodding. He went through an even longer version of his ritual before moving downwards using his skill. Fitoria frowned as the Water Dragon reached for the Hero. She inspected the communication but let it be after she noted that they were merely speaking and that the Hero was being guided towards the Hourglass.

"Fitoria," asked Trystan, while she was waiting, "will big brother be okay?"

She turned to see that he was very concerned. He was biting his lip as he looked at her with concern in his eyes. He was waiting. Waiting like she had whenever her master had gone to fight without her.

"He's fine," she said, checking just to be certain, "The Sword Hero will be back soon."

To her surprise he shook his head, "Not about him going down." he said, "about Isis being gone to this other world. He's really worried even though I know that sis will be okay and I don't know what to _do._"

Fitoria hesitated, she knew that the Sword Hero was angry and scared and determined, but he was almost _always _like that. His worry and concern were also like before, back when she met him for the first time and fought Isis and Trystan. Fitoria knew that Isis had been sent to another world, she could sense the Filolial through their shared connection thanks to her Vassal Weapon, it was why she was sure that the Shield Hero was alive and why she had reassured the Sword Hero before, even if he hadn't relaxed at all despite that. Plus, she had agreed to help him with travelling there _and _had given him both a new Enhancement Method for his soul and the chance to fight many Waves to empower himself.

"He will be fine," she honestly reassured her heir, "your master will be okay soon."

The boy smiled at her brightly, all fear and uncertainty removed before he paused and looked at her with a little bit of confusion, "He's my brother," said the baby filolial.

She smiled at him, "Of course,"

He pouted at her statement, "Fitoria-" he started, before turning to the Sword Hero who had appeared inside the carriage, "Big Bro! Welcome back!"

The Hero looked a little puzzled but smiled back at the boy and moved into his seat as he patted his head, "You're quite excited all of a sudden," he muttered.

"I'm not!" exclaimed the child, while the other smiled at him, amused. Some of the negative emotions lifted and Fitoria could feel the precise moment when the Sword Hero realized why Trystan was acting so energetically. His emotions were bittersweet and for a moment she was tempted.

Fitoria shook her head, removing her foolish thoughts, and ignored the conversation. She focused on the Legendary Sword, a moment was all she needed to confirm that he was registered to all the Hourglasses. She smiled as satisfaction surged through her. She wouldn't have to fight the Waves as long as the Hero did his part. Fitoria knew that he was scared of her and that he needed her help with the Shield Hero and Isis. He would not disobey.

"Fitoria," said the Sword Hero, pulling out a map using his sword, "can you point me towards the Spear Hero? I can deal with him before the Next Wave."

Fitoria shrugged before focusing on the combined effect of draining and then altering the power of the Dragon Veins that all the Heroes had. She ignored the two nearby sources and the dimensionally distant one and tried to narrow down the exact location of the last one. It took her a minute to find the warping effect and a long moment to get a grasp on exactly where it was. Her Vassal Weapon flared up and told her where the place was on a map and she pointed it out on his.

He frowned at the area she had marked, "Near the capital," he muttered, before turning to her and speaking normally, "Thank you Fitoria,"

She nodded and then waited as he hesitated for a moment before he spoke again, "Would you be willing to _temporarily _go on the other side of the rift and level up whatever team I send to find the Shield Hero and Isis?" his voice was firm, but his emotions were volatile, "The biggest risk to any party that goes to another dimension shall be during the start when the Wave is in play but it is also the biggest chance to get some experience. With your help, they could level up fast thanks to your weapon _and _you'd be able to return without any risk."

Fitoria paused and twisted the idea in her head. "That is fine," she said, realizing that without the Waves she was not busy at all, and like this, she wouldn't disobey her master either, as she would still be here to defend the world.

The Hero waited for some reason and she tilted her head wondering what he wanted, "Thank you," he finally said, preparing his portal, "We'll take our leave."

The Sword Hero picked up the other Hero and then quickly got his party ready. She nodded at the various goodbye's and allowed the Portal to activate.

They were gone between one heartbeat and the next. She could sense that the destination was quite close to the area where she had first tested Isis and Trystan. She almost activated her own portal but paused for a second. Something felt odd. It took her many long seconds before she understood.

The carriage was empty.


	39. Chapter 39

Adrian

The portal connected them to their destination. Adrian and his party found themselves in the forests near Ayrith. He checked on his party members and Itsuki. Verified that they were in decent health and then drew out a small wooden disc to place Itsuki on. The boy was light but carrying him was annoying.

"Everything alright?" he asked, then shook his head.

What a stupid question.

Isis was gone and the Shield Hero was in another dimension. They had no idea what had happened to them. Isis could be dead or worse. The Book Hero had no use for her. He hoped that bastard was dead. But Adrian wasn't willing to bet on it, not when he had received no experience for that battle.

At least that man had some use for Naofumi.

It was a spark of positive news.

It would take five days for the earliest Wave to open. That underscored how helpless he was. There was no guarantee that the next Wave would lead to Isis. Nor could he be certain that any search party he sent would survive the unknown dimension. Anyone he sent would probably die without accomplishing anything.

"We're fine," said Raphtalia. Rifana offered him a hesitant smile. Trystan tried to look optimistic.

Adrian failed to smile back. He wanted to reassure them, but he didn't want to lie.

Fatigue smothered his mind.

He didn't even know how he was awake at this point. Raphtalia, Trystan and Rifana had gotten a chance to rest. He hadn't given that they hit an hourglass every 5-10 minutes.

Not that he would have been able to rest. Not when the battle with the Book Hero kept running through his mind. Adrian was pathetic. He had become so arrogant, so confident because he had gained enough power to challenge the Waves.

Isis and Naofumi paid the price for his folly.

He took a deep breath. Considered their worried looks and his muddled thoughts, "We need to talk about this," he said.

"This?" asked Raphtalia, and Adrian cursed himself. He needed to be clearer.

"Rescuing Isis and the Shield Hero," he said. Their expressions changed. Grim determination filled them.

"We'll save them, brother," said Trystan, his voice, his tone and his words all serious. Not a hint of his jovial nature. Adrian almost smiled.

It was a pity that Trystan's words were naive.

"If you choose to help then there are a lot of things to consider," he said. He held up a hand when the moved to jump in, "let me finish." Adrian took in a deep breath and tried to stay calm. He bought a moment by pulling out some furniture.

He wanted to have Isis back at his side. Her absence was a void. Adrian hadn't known how much of a comfort it had been to be able to feel her mana or see her using Blindsight. It was a suffocating thought to realize that he might have to ignore the earliest Wave.

Going unprepared was suicide.

"Getting to the rift is not a problem. Remember that once you are on the other side you will not know the language they speak, the food that they eat or the average level of combat ability," he said. finding his worries pouring out with no order, "The nature of their society could be dangerous. Hell, the magic that they have could be different. Plus, you won't have me there to level you up or to act as long-range support-"

"Are you saying that you don't want to save sis?!" said Trystan, genuine anger seeping into his words.

"NO!" he said, paused and said gently, "no. Never...but I don't want to lose you either. If you walk into this situation with so little information and no support then I won't only lose Isis. I'll lose everyone sent after her.'

Trystan looked stunned. Raphtalia and Rifana were surprised. He realized that this was not the time for this conversation. Not now when he couldn't think straight.

He paused for a moment. Closed his eyes and shut down all his senses, even Blindsight.

It was incredible how blind he felt.

He opened his eyes. Activated his senses again. Verified their safety then looked at the three children he was responsible for.

Trystan and Rifana's showed some fear. That hurt, but Raphtalia's understanding expression was more painful.

"I'm sorry," he said, looking at the night sky, both to distract himself and gauge the time, "let's get some rest. We can talk about this later."

"Mr Adrian," said Raphtalia before he could turn away and start moving towards Ayrith. He looked at her with apprehension, "we'll be okay. Even if it is going to be very hard we will rescue Isis and the Shield Hero."

Rifana nodded. Trystan erased his fear and let out a loud cheer in support of Raphtalia. Adrian found himself smiling, but he wanted to cry.

These adorable fools didn't realize the scope of their enemy.

He could tell that Raphtalia wanted to comfort him, but it felt like mockery. For a moment he considered thanking her and letting this go. The memories of his battle with the Book Hero echoed in his mind. Adrian had no doubt that had they been present they would have died.

He moved to agree with her, but what came out was, "The man I fought was as strong as I am. If you fight him then you will die and it is likely that Isis is either dead at his hands or has been captured by him."

His own words surprised him. Adrian watched Trystan wilt. Rifana stared at him with horror but it was Raphtalia who stunned him.

"What you say might be true but that doesn't matter. Isis might still be alive and that is enough." she said, "I know that this will be difficult. We could die or fail, but we will do it anyway. Have some faith in us."

Adrian laughed. It was not a controlled laugh nor a happy one. It was a loud grating noise.

He couldn't stop.

"Thank you," he said after a long minute. He didn't know how to apologize to them. Or how he could make up for his shameful behaviour.

Trystan slammed into him and held on tight.

Adrian hugged him back.

He looked at his party, not his charges, not anymore, not after this. Not when he could hardly think of himself as something better when he was so weak. "We'll figure something out," he said, his thoughts starting to move. Grief and fury driving them forward.

Raphtalia's smile and Rifana's relieved look was humbling. It was a reminder that these two had suffered far more than he had, and very recently at that. So what if they were weaker than him in a fight? That was nothing more than one limited form of power.

He picked up Trystan and held the boy as they moved towards Ayrith at his signal. Adrian mentally apologized to them. He knew that they were in danger for as long as they were by his side. The Book Hero wouldn't be the last threat that they couldn't hope to match but he didn't want to leave them behind.

Adrian didn't think that he could.


	40. Chapter 40

_**Raphtalia **_

"He's better now," said Rifana, her voice holding some cheer. Raphtalia shared a look with her friend and smiled. Rifana went back to her conversation with Nicol. Raphtalia found her smile fading as her attention strayed to Adrian.

She knew that he wasn't alright.

He was acting. Greeting Mr Oldrin with the same distant, polite tone she was familiar with. He smiled like nothing was wrong but he was still holding onto Trystan. The filolial was more than happy to spend time with his father. The boy was sitting on his shoulder looking around the village. Sometimes he'd wave at one of the children who were looking at their leader and their saviour speak.

They had arrived in town a couple of minutes ago. Already most of the town had come to take a look at Mr Adrian. She could tell that they _all _knew that he was the Sword Hero now. More than a few of them glanced at his sword and all had looks of either awe or fear. Mr Adrian had paid them no mind glancing at them once and nodding at the rare few who met his eyes. He was assessing them as threats and dismissing them.

"Are you going to join us?" asked Rifana. Raphtalia turned to Nicol and a girl her age standing next to the older woman.

Nicol hesitated, "I...I think I am." she said, "but…"

Raphtalia understood. It was hard to imagine how powerful a Hero was without witnessing it. Raphtalia had heard dozens of stories about the Heroes. Many of them were about the Sword Hero but none of them had prepared her for Adrian. Without that awareness, it was easy to fear the Waves.

"Mr Adrian doesn't need your help with the Waves," she admitted. Surprise bloomed on Nicol and her fellow villager. "He can defeat a Wave by himself, but he wants to be sure that there is no damage done and that he defeats _all _the monsters. He'll do everything he can to keep you safe."

Her mind turned back to the Wave that they fought under Fitoria's supervision. Raphtalia had not understood it in the heat of battle. Mr Adrian had funnelled monsters to them for practice and had chosen to extend the Wave.

The cautious, careful man who _never _did anything without planning it out had chosen to toy with the Wave. That was absolute proof that he had found the Wave simple to deal with. To her surprise, Raphtalia herself had found it quite easy.

The woman was silent for a moment and then looked at Mr Adrian and Mr Oldrin who had walked up to the gate. She could feel that Mr Adrian was doing something to the plant.

"Then where is the other girl?" asked Nicol, "if the Waves didn't take her then…"

Raphtalia grimaced and kept her anger under check. Nicol didn't know. She had a right to ask. Anger filled her regardless when she saw Mr Adrian turn towards Nicol. He moved back into his work within a second.

Ignorant or not Nicol was picking at a gaping wound.

Rifana answered for her. "The Sword Hero was trying to save the Shield Hero-"

Raphtalia glared at Rifana who clamped her mouth shut. Mr Adrian had told them to let _him _tell the others about this. They weren't supposed to spread it around.

"Keep that a secret," she commanded, glancing at Mr Adrian who turned to look at her at the right moment to smile and nod. She felt her worry fade.

Ms Nicol nodded, but her apprehension had returned. Raphtalia felt a little bad that it seemed that Ms Nicol _wouldn't _be joining them. Raphtalia understood. Ayrith was her home and it must be very scary for the wolf-demihuman to give up everything for a risky endeavour.

"What?!" said Nicol, looking at something behind her. Raphtalia turned to see and then gaped as the trees that protected the town began to change.

The trees were already quite tall. Their many branches were full of fruit-bearing trees. She could see them getting even taller right in front of her eyes. Within seconds their heights had doubled.

Impressive, but it was what happened next that shocked her.

Glowing branches began to grow out of the higher sections of the tree. Within a second the darkness that permeated the village was gone. It was like Adrian had planted a smaller sun right above Ayrith.

Raphtalia glanced at Mr Adrian who had let Trystan down so that the Filolial could climb up trees. He speaking to Mr Oldrin who was thanking him. The old man turned towards the village centre and called for Nicol and another girl named Augusta. Mr Adrian turned towards her and signalled her to come as well. A quick look at Rifana and they both followed Nicol.

She noted how easy it was to catch up to Nicol. A reminder of their difference in stats.

Mr Oldrin was smiling, "Daughter!" he said, his broad hands waving about as his tail swished behind him, "Have you made your decision? And what about you Augusta?"

Nicol hesitated but a glance at the village around her had her nod. "Yes Father," she said, sharing a look with her friend, "we're ready."

"Excellent," he said, with a bow "Lord Hero. I cannot thank you enough. With this, we will no longer have to worry about the dark nor the threats that wield it as their weapon. Thank you."

Oldrin looked certain and eager. Mr Adrian did not. He turned towards Nicol and Augusta.

"You both have doubts," he said, his voice certain. Nicol opened her mouth to protest but he continued, "that is wise. Let me show you that I _can _empower you enough to survive the ordeals you will face. If you choose to join be and rest assured that I promise _never _to throw your lives away. So give me a couple of hours. I will delevel you and then raise your power to level 40. After that, I will tell you about what I expect from you and you can make a final choice. Is that acceptable?"

Nicol looked surprised but still dared to ask. Even in the face of her friend's and father's disapproval, "Sir Hero please do not waste your time on us." she said, "please allow us to understand what you expect of us first before we squander your blessings."

Raphtallia could see that Mr Oldrin looked furious. Mr Adrian was approving. He thought her to be impressive and Raphtalia did as well. Ms Nicol had not stopped thinking because of the massive debt she had to Adrian. Raphtalia knew that even if Mr Adrian would never trust blind faith. As odd as it sounded he preferred it when people had obvious, ulterior motives.

"Of course," he said, his tone firm, but with an undertone of grief, "It's a little complex so please bear with me…"

So, he explained, about Isis' loss and who was responsible. He also expanded on the Waves they were to fight. He didn't give specifics but he allowed her to grasp the situation. Nicol considered every word but Mr Oldrin and Augusta looked at Mr Adrian with awe.

Ms Nicol spoke after Adrian had finished his explanations, "I'm sorry about your daughter." she said, her voice determined, "I'll help find her it is the least I can do after you returned Alvin and Razieh to us."

Augusta and Oldrin added their voices to her promise. Raphtalia smiled at their support and the stunned look on the Sword Hero. It was at times like this that she realized how little he understood when it came to how much he helped people. He had saved her life and that of Rifana. He had reached out to a slave and granted her a better life. Then changed his plans to save a friend of that slave when she could offer him _nothing. _

He looked at the world assuming that it was cruel, and it was, but he seemed to assume that he was cruel. He was always underestimating his kindness.

It annoyed her.

"Thank you," he said, his voice was warmer, "I'll do my best to prepare you for it. In fact," he mused, looking at her and then at their two new allies, "let's get started right now."

Raphtalia interrupted here, "Mr Adrian," she said, her tone short, "you _need _to rest. I don't think you've slept in days please stop punishing yourself like-"

He laughed, a small chuckle compared to that mad laugh a couple of minutes prior. "Thank you," he said, and then promised, "I'll rest soon. Let me get a couple of things done first."

She nodded. Well aware that this was the best she was going to get from him. Raphtalia turned to Ms Nicol only to find that all three of the villagers were staring at her with a shared expression of shock and awe.

"What is it?" she asked, feeling quite uncomfortable. They didn't answer but she heard Mr Adrian's amused laugh from behind her.


	41. Chapter 41

The monsters here were much stronger than the ones that appeared during the Waves. Raphtalia noted the large two-headed snake monster. Judged her position and the monster's and waited for Trystan to make an opening for her and Rifana.

Trystan tore it's head off. Raphtalia jumped into action. Her Sword cut through the snake's scales with. The screech it unleashed was deafening. Rifana did the same and then moved back as it began to flail around.

Trystan put an end to that by crashing down on the other head. They waited for a moment. Turned to Ms Nicol after they received their experience.

Ms Nicol was standing on a disc high above them and as soon as the battle finished she dropped down as the disc lowered. Augusta and the Bow Hero were both presents on the disc as well. It was rather reassuring to have the disc lower so fast after they won their fight. It was proof that Mr Adrian was observing them.

At the moment, they were on what Mr Adrian had described as an 'abandoned continent'. There would be no chance of any witnesses and the monsters that had been alone for millennia. It was the reason why he was cutting loose. She could see the massive beams of light that lit up the sky. He banished the night itself. She could only see and navigate the formerly dense forest due to her perception stat. It was very kind of Mr Adrian to ravage the forest around them so completely. He had annihilated Large portions. He'd killed thousands if not tens of thousands of monsters.

Raphtalia, Trystan and Rifana hadn't leveled up even once despite that.

The experience was going to Nicol and Augusta. They would need a higher level to survive.

"Well done," said Nicol. "you're all improving fast. You overpower the monsters with ease. We'll have to spar to help you get used to the tricks that humanoid or intelligent opponents throw at you."

Raphtalia nodded with a faint sense of satisfaction. It was odd. She'd never fought without Isis. The thought was bittersweet. Raphtalia promised herself again. Isis would be back with them.

"Can we spar now?!" asked Trystan, his tone serious. Voice soft. Not at like she'd expect from a giant bird, "we haven't fought other people."

Raphtalia was glad to see how serious he could be. Adrian rarely showed his worry to Trystan. What had occurred hours prior had scared Trystan. Still, Raphtalia couldn't deny that it was good that he was serious.

Nicol shared a look with Augusta who said, "We can once we get a couple of levels. It will take us another hour or so before we can fight you without dying."

Nicol shook her head. An incredulous expression marked her face, "3 hours," she said. "Level 1 to Level 29 in three hours. We'll be at level 40 within another hour or two. Did you all level this fast?"

Raphtalia frowned and considered the statement, "Isis, Trystan and I were a bit slower. Rifana was about this fast. We leveled faster than this during the Wave though."

The naked surprise on both their expressions was strange. Mr Adrian was a bit faster than normal today. Maybe it was that power-up thing that Fitoria and Mr Adrian were talking about. After studying them for a moment longer Raphtalia asked a question.

"How long does it normally take to get to level 40?"

The two people from Ayrith shared a long look before Nicol answered. "It can take years to get to level 40 though some people manage it a lot faster. Even then though it should take months to manage." she said, before shaking her head, "and he's got access to an hourglass to start a Class Up ritual. This is mad."

Rifana corrected her, "This is the power of a Hero."

Raphtalia saw that Rifana was about to continue when the disc started to move around them. They got the message. Mr Adrian must have finished harvesting the area while they had been talking. She promised herself to stay focused and got onto it. Careful to keep the Bow Hero in place even though he was bound to the disc.

Once they were all on the large disc. It moved above the canopy where the absolute devastation became clear. She could almost see the Hourglass they had teleported to. He had razed huge portions of the forest in an expanding circle around the Hourglass. No fires, no signs of damage other than the forest being gone.

Mr Adrian was dropping something small onto the soil that grew into one of his plants in seconds. It was taller than the Canopy and was almost 100 meters tall. It made her realize that it was one of many and that the others had blended in with the remnants of the area.

They began to move again. Raphtalia took a deep breath. She had no time to waste. She needed to build as much skill as possible in these five days.

It was her only choice.

"Any concerns?" asked Mr Adrian. The glow from the Hourglass faded. Nicol and Augusta tested themselves out. They were moving much faster now.

Nicol shook her head, "This is…" she said, before turning to Adrian and giving him a deep bow, "Thank you, Sir Adrian. We would have never gained such strength without your help."

Raphtalia had to admit that she was a little surprised. Nicol had been polite but she had never been so...reverent. Mr Adrian looked calm but he wasn't happy. He had liked her scepticism.

"Don't worry about it Nicol," he said, before turning to Augusta. She confirmed that she was okay as well, "If you both are fine then let's get onto the discs. I have something to do before you start sparring with each other."

Mr Adrian drew out an extra disc to go with the one that held the Bow Hero. She noticed that Nicol was uncomfortable and moved over to the empty disc. Mr Adrian walked over to the one with the other Hero. Raphtalia joined Nicol and Augusta. Rifana followed her while Trystan jumped in his bird form, transformed in mid-air and landed on Adrian's platform.

In seconds they were high above the Hourglass and she could see the remains of the once populated forest. It was nothing more than some scrubs and hundreds of 100-meter tall trees that Mr Adrian had planted. An eerie sight.

Nicol was looking around the area with awe. Raphtalia understood. Mr Adrian had taken a monster-infested area and turned it into a wasteland with ease. Trees and beams that he could fire forever.

"We're on the lost continent," muttered Nicol, staring at the mountains on the horizon and the river cutting through the forest they were in.

The Lost Continent, she thought, trying to remember where she had heard the name before.

"It's amazing," agreed Rifana, "I never thought that this place would be real or that I could visit here."

Raphtalia stared as her friend and Ms Nicol started a spirited conversation about this continent. Myth. Right, the Legendary Continent on the other side. Hundreds of stories of adventures had started here. Raphtalia was curious but before she could even think a loud rumbling sound filled the area.

Raphtalia immediately had her sword in hand. Everyone on her disc was in a similar position. She looked around, both at the sky and the land beneath them but found nothing. Possibilities flooded her mind. The source of the noise must have been underground or invisible. Her attention strayed towards Mr Adrian and Trystan who were calm. Mr Adrian had two blades in his hands but was holding them casually. Trystan was lying down.

Doubts flared. They vanished a moment later. A massive structure-no, a building- emerged out of the ground. In seconds the forest, the soil and all the remains that Mr Adrian had seen fit not to absorb had been consumed by vines that seemed to dissolve them by producing some type of acid from underground. Dozens of other buildings. Each of them different from the other but sharing the same basic properties rose. They were at least four stories tall with a shape that was almost like a Pyramid that had its top cut off.

As Raphtalia turned around she realized that this was happening everywhere around her. It didn't take her long to realize that he had created a town. A large one. Raphtalia glanced at the other disc only to realize that Mr Adrian wasn't there.

"There," exclaimed Rifana, pointing high up in the air, higher than the disc. Adrian was there floating as the buildings were reinforced by walls and then hundreds of vines. Defences. She could see wooden streets and even glowing lights as several vines started to glow in the dark. Hundreds of thousands of vines lit up at the same time turning Night into day. Similar things were happening further away.

The disc began to descend. She realized that the town had only looked small because of the distance she had been observing it from. This place was huge. The same size as the capital. Raphtalia got the impression of being very small. It was beautiful and empty.

Once the disc was near the ground she jumped off. Her companions followed and Mr Adrian and Trystan had been waiting for them.

"Nicol, Augusta," he said and waited for a response. The two women were staring at the ground paved with some sort of rough black coloured wood. It felt strong.

He called for them again and this time the jerked in place and turned to Adrian. "Sorry," she said, before looking straight at him, "What is it Sword Hero?"

"I'd like for you two to help Trystan and Rifana train for a couple of hours. Spar and practise some magic. Leave your leveling to me." he said, before pointing at a large open space "there's a large area there for some practice. Try your best to break it. I want to see how much punishment it can take."

"Understood," she said and walked away, her tone suggesting that she had questions.

Trystan and Rifana looked a bit confused. Raphtalia looked at Adrian who answered their silent concern. "I have something important to discuss with Raphtalia. It's about her family."

Raphtalia looked at Mr Adrian. Her mind raced, trying to understand what he could be talking about.

Mr Adrian didn't give her much time to think and instead sent her a party invite. She accepted it thoughtlessly and then felt the portal activate. When her surrounding cleared after the shift she was standing at their previous home. It was near the Hourglass that Fitoria had first led them to. Only now did she realize that the disc and the Bow Hero were with them as well.

"Mr Adrian," she said, a silent question in her voice. He nodded and held up his hand before creating a table, and two chairs along with some drinks. They sat down. He took a deep breath before draining two of his drinks- no, Stamina and Soul Soothing potions -how tired was he? The answer came to her immediately. He created a city, even if it was only the skeleton of it, of course, he's tired.

"Do you remember the last hourglass we visited? How the carriage shook?" he asked, "Fitoria mentioned a Water Dragon."

Raphtalia nodded, unsure about where he was going, "That dragon," he said, "told me that you were the heir to that nation. The Heavenly Empress of Q'ten Lo. He wanted me to help you secure your place. The current government is not fulfilling its duties."

Raphtalia wasn't certain what to say. The idea was surreal. Papa and Mama hadn't said anything about Q'ten Lo.

"Are you sure?" she asks. Mr Adrian stared at her while taking another sip from his potion.

"Yes, and not because of the Dragon." he said, "while I was there I noticed more people like those three spies who followed us in Dragon Territory. They showed up in a similar way to my sensory skills. I'd assumed that they had been after me but I'm guessing they were following you. I was a target of convenience or not a target at all."

Towards the end, his tone had shifted into anger. Raphtalia tried to think this through. There was no way that she was royalty of some distant nation. Her parents had never said anything about it and if they were royalty then why were they in another country? It didn't make any-No, it might. Her Father and Mother sometimes spoke in a different language with Sadeena and each other but that meant that they used to travel. Papa did always talk about other countries.

"Raphtalia?" asked Mr Adrian, shaking her away from her thoughts, "any idea about this?"

She frowned but told him about her parents and Sadeena.

He nodded, "So our only possible methods of verification are dead either by my hand or because of the Waves." he said, his tone was calm before turning vicious "those worthless pieces of scum…"

"Mr Adrian?" she asked, caught off guard, her thoughts disrupted by his anger.

He shook his head, "They were observing you." he said, with a loud sigh when she nodded, "observing you for who knows how long. During the Wave and during everything else that followed. They don't care about your life but don't want to kill you...I don't know what to make of that."

Raphtalia felt a chill before fury replaced it. Sadeena, her parents, everyone in her village. They had all suffered so much and she had seen the fight between Mr Adrian and those three people. They had been strong. Strong enough to survive an attack from Mr Adrian. They could have saved everyone.

"Don't worry about them too much," he said, "they are not a priority for the moment. I doubt they can find you with all the teleportation that we do. I wanted to inform you because this is about you and you should have the information needed to think about it. Our actual topic of discussion is more immediately critical."

Raphtalia nodded, even if her heart felt heavy, and tried to focus. Wondering if this next piece of information would be as bad.

"I'm planning to go to the capital to rescue the slaves that were held captive with you and teleport them to the new base," he said. "You and Nicol will take charge."

He explained his plan to free them and then teleport them to the new city. The fact that only two of the buildings were furnished and that he planned to give her the food and medicine right now. The conversation lasted for ten minutes and she realized that this whole day had been about setting up his plan to free the slaves.

Gathering reliable allies in a well-defended and remote area for the sake of safety and protection from tracking. It was something only a Hero could do. No one else would have the combination of the ability to free slaves, teleport them, heal them, feed them and shelter them with ease.

"My teleportation is limited to 16 people every 30 minutes so I'll have to wait for at least two hours…" he paused here, hesitating before pushing through. "I'll be using that time to scout the Castle Town so that I can capture the Hero of the Cane."

Raphtalia flinched and slammed her drink down without a thought.

"Mr Adrian?" she asked, "what-"

"He is the King of Melromarc," he stated icily, "and he has a Vassal Weapon that can be used to travel worlds. He is the only Vassal Wielder that I know of other than Fitoria and he is already my enemy."

She nodded. Her protests faded away. The King was the same man who had destroyed Lurolana. He had ravaged the entire Seaetto region. The King had accused Adrian of rape and hunted down the Shield Hero for his convenience. There were only two concerns.

"Do you need to do this? Won't Fitoria be enough?" she asked, looking at him dead in the eye. Trying to make him tell the truth.

"Fitoria is unreliable. Hell, the only reason I've asked her to help you level up is so that she'll feel tempted to go and rescue them herself. With her speed that would be trivial." he said.

"But that is not your real worry I'll be fine-" he said, before pausing for several seconds and staring at her and then speaking in a more solemn tone. He had understood her real concern, "Let me correct myself I should be fine. The Book Hero is likely an exception and I won't let the guy get off a single shot before I have him crippled. And normal soldiers and mages are nothing considering I can attack from far enough to not even worry about most of them. I'll be in and out in less than a minute."

She nodded. Still uncertain but confident in his strength. Then she realized something.

"You're going to do this alone," she said.

"Of course," he said, his tone brokering no argument.

"Adrian," she said, ignoring his implicit warning, "we can help. You know that we can defeat most soldiers. At the very least let us be there in case something goes wrong."

The sword hero stared at her for a minute. Two minutes and then a third before he said, "I need you here. You are in charge of the freed slaves and I need you to settle them until I return and it will take me some time since I need to check in on the Spear Hero as well." he paused, "and honestly...I don't want history to repeat itself. As things stand, if the Book Hero shows up again you will die."

His words didn't frighten her. Death had not been something she had feared for weeks now. Truthfully, even now she felt like she was living on borrowed time. Raphtalia knew that she should have died in that Cage. Adrian had performed a miracle to bring her to where she was now.

But she realized that it wasn't for her sake that he wanted her to stay. His dead tone, tired, as if all his energy was gone told her that it was because he wanted her to stay safe for him to be at peace. The selfishness set her on edge until she remembered that he had seen Isis thrown into another dimension. It wasn't that he was abandoning them it was because he was sad.

It didn't help. Her thoughts were still a muddled haze of rage and grief. Isis' loss was one that she felt as well. And that snapped the pieces together.

"That's why you brought the Bow Hero here," she said, "you wanted them to be safe. You plan on sending me back there after telling me all this so that if there is an attack we'll be safe. And if you...if you die. We'll have a place to live. You...this whole day you've been preparing for your death."

He didn't move. His expression didn't change for a long minute before he nodded. "You've missed some parts of the plan and remember that this is in case I die. I plan to stay alive. If you are stuck there Trystan can reach Fitoria who can teleport you out. She is quite apathetic but she is not cruel and cares for Trystan in her way-"

He made to continue but she couldn't listen anymore. Raphtalia was an idiot. He was scared about them dying. He was worried about dying. The thought was horrible. Tears filled up. He must have come close to death against the Book Hero, but he hadn't shown it. Not in front of them.

She didn't realize when he had gotten up or when he had reached her side and placed a hesitant hand on her shoulder. Raphtalia hugged him. Adrian stiffened for a moment before relaxing. It was an awkward hug, but she wanted him to know that she was here. That she'd be here and that he wasn't going to leave them and die. They'd find Isis, bring her back and then they would be complete again.

"Adrian," she said, her voice muffled because her head was still pressed against his stomach. "Don't die." she commanded, "you're not allowed to."

He started shaking. It took her a second to realize that he was laughing. A bitter, cold laugh.

"I'm sorry," she heard, "I know this is not something I should throw on you but you're the only one whom I can trust. I don't trust Nicol or her friend and Trystan is too young. Rifana barely speaks to me and it has only been a week since we freed her," he said, shaking his head. "...it's not fair but even if I do my best I could end up dead and we need to prepare for that."

Raphtalia swallowed that truth and nodded. Her eyes had dried out and now that she was calm she could see what he was doing. Adrian was trying to reduce the shock that would occur if he did die.

Smart, kind and cruel.

His plan was true to his nature.


End file.
